I: WANDERLUST

DEDICATED TO

Sam Whitten, for being such a great companion on this life-changing trip, and for being such a good sport in Santa Fe. And to Savannah, for being a large part of the inspiration for this whole thing, and for the time we spent together over that incredible summer.

THE BEGINNING OF A GREAT JOURNEY

     Cresting a desolate hill in Beckham County, I was met with a sea of red dirt, and immediately I knew: I was home.

     Between the Pacific Ocean and the Great Lakes, I had rolled over ten thousand miles, through twenty states, over the course of thirty-nine days.

     Through it all, I’d broken my car, myself, and my bank account, spending over eight thousand dollars. Incredible.

     Wind caught a loose piece of weatherstripping on the windshield and sent an obnoxious rattling throughout the cabin that I couldn’t ignore. I kept a close eye on the coolant temp, but it hadn’t boiled over yet. Oklahoma asphalt slid smoothly under my whitewalls as I pushed the speed limit, praying that there were no cops nearby.

     Once on the highway, the remaining journey would be muscle memory. I could drive I-40 from Elk City to the Metro with my eyes closed. Lying ahead was open road, and plenty of time to think.

     After all I had been through, this is how I ended up. Destitute, sleepless, and hungry on a back road near Sweetwater. How in God’s name did I get here?

     I rubbed my lower lip and recounted to myself everything that had happened up to this point.

ANYTHING BUT CALM BEFORE THE STORM

     NORMAN, OKLAHOMA

     JUNE 5, 2022

     For the past two weeks, all I could do was get ready and wait. My bag was packed a week before leaving. My car was cleaned and serviced the day before. I had installed a new radio and replaced the dashboard with one that had been painted blue to match my wheels. My things were already in the trunk and ready to go. Everything had been building up to this.

     I got to work as a storm rolled in from the west. Dark clouds whipped up winds and poured rain occasionally. Would this be a delay? Would the roads still be wet? How long would this go on?

     “So you’re going on your big trip, huh?” my boss asked me.

     “Yep! I’m heading out this afternoon.”

     “You excited?”

     “Of course I’m excited. Anything to get away from this place for a bit.”

     “Where all are you going?” another coworker asked.

     “I’m going to Black Mesa first, then Denver, maybe, then to New Mexico to see the girl I’ve been dating. Then Las Vegas, L.A., San Francisco, and finally Eugene before hiking Pariah Canyon.”

     “You’re dating a girl in New Mexico?”

     “I found her in Oklahoma. She’s just working a seasonal job in New Mexico.”

     We met back in March. Our first date was a frenetic night of driving, talking, and listening to music. I’d hooked her by telling her my favorite song was “Psychotic Reaction.” I went home feeling like she was mine. But when I woke up the day after, with her being the first thing on my mind, I knew I was hers. She slipped away to New Mexico for the summer, and even though I had plenty of reason to head west, she was the catalyst that demanded I actually dedicate the time and money, if nothing more than just to see her.

     Puzzled, my coworker asked:

     “What’s in Eugene?”

     “My ex.” I admitted shyly. “We’re still friends, and she has my cats. Plus, I told her I’d visit her, and the west coast is as close as I’m gonna get.”

     “And you said you’re heading out today?” My boss asked.

     A thunderclap roared across the sky. The ground shook and the rain poured down.

     “I plan on it, yes.”

     But right now things were looking uncertain. I had no idea what the campsite in Felt looked like. No way I’d sleep on the cold ground out in the rain. Sleeping in the car is a possibility, but it would be pretty cramped.

     For the next few hours I watched the sky. The clouds went from charcoal to gray to white before dissipating entirely. I was still buzzing with a nervous energy up until three o’clock. I looked at my boss and threw my shop rag in the bin.

     “Are you leaving?”

     “I can’t stand it any longer. I have to.”

     He bid me safe travels as another coworker hugged me. I told her I’d bring the hat she gave me all the way to the ocean, but never promised that I’d wear it. I walked to the back room and clocked out. A dull electric current coursed through my veins as I walked to the door. Once I crossed the threshold, the buzzing stopped. I felt at peace. The burden of waiting had been lifted off my shoulders, after all this time: months worth of waiting.

     Liberty.

     In the parking lot, I changed out of my work shirt and into a hideous Hawaiian shirt gifted to me by Sam in celebration of the trip. I lit a cigarette and honked at my coworkers, waving goodbye for over a month. Heading south on I-35, the windows were down and the music was up. It was finally starting. Following in the tire tracks of my literary heroes, I was pushing the gas down in pursuit of ADVENTURE! Now I’m taking the same Great American Road Trip. Playing tourist, transient, and poet. Who knows what lies beyond?

     At home, I took the last shower I’d have in a long time. Sporting the open Hawaiian shirt, I knocked on Sam’s door. I shyly turned away as he kissed his girlfriend goodbye and went to start the car. We lit celebratory cigarettes and then we were off! We were finally doing it! Going on the road!

     Our enthusiasm was immediately ebbed by a traffic jam on 9. We slogged along until passing the cause of the jam: a fender bender between a Nissan and an old Chevy. Now we were off. I put on “Jumpin’ Jack Flash,” pushed the pedal down, and turned north on 35. The metro blurred by. I thought of all the familiar spots and the memories it held: bars, date spots, gigs. It was all behind me now. What lay ahead was a mystery.

     Off of 40, we turned towards Geary. Worn out but idyllic houses sat in rows lining the main streets of the towns we passed through. It reminded me of the stories I had heard from my parents’ youth in Small Town, Oklahoma. It was the kind of place where everyone knew everyone, and everyone had a story about everyone. The backdoors were left unlocked and the children unsupervised. The crime and alienation of the Big City were a hundred miles away. This was the kind of place that constantly brings you back, if you were ever compelled to leave. This was Cherokee.

     I must’ve sold Sam on the idea, because now he wanted to go. He challenged me to do it without the aid of navigation and I had only driven myself to Cherokee a handful of times. But I knew what direction to head in, or so I thought.

     I took a wrong turn only once, which resulted in us taking a detour through Roman Nose State Park. Back on the state highway, I knew we were on the right track.

     “There’s the abandoned house. I’ve passed by it every time my family’s taken me to Cherokee.”

     “Have you ever been in?”

     “Of course not.”

     My family wasn’t the type to poke around old places.

     “Do you want to go?”

     “Sure! Why not?”

     I am. So I turned the car around and went back.

     “That was easier than I had expected” Sam remarked.

     I parked the car on the shoulder opposite the house and waded through the tall grass separating the structure from the road, mindful of snakes the whole way. Peering in through the gaping front window, I saw furniture left by the previous residents among the debris from collapsed pieces of ceiling and dirt that had blown in. Weather and time had done a number on this place. The wallpaper was peeling and the wind-torn fabric of the sofa lay limply in the still June air. I had to see more.

     Sam climbed in first through a door at the front of the house. To the left was a living room with chairs tossed about, and to the right, a kitchen. The oven was tipped over, and the doors from the cabinets ripped off. The bare walls and ceiling were damaged, and the linoleum tiles were peeling at the edges. I tried to make sense of what had happened here, but didn’t put it together until later:

     The kitchen’s condition deteriorated more towards the oven, and looked as if the vintage enamel-coated box was emitting radioactive rays that could degrade wood and chip paint.

     So it was a fire.

     Once, a family occupied this cute little house on the prairie: drinking coffee and watching the sun rise over the fields, then watching it set from the covered front porch. Surrounded by open plains and the cool air they’d open their windows under the summer stars. But one morning, or evening, or midnight, or midday, a fire breaks out. Flames reach up the wall and across the ceiling. The linoleum tile below warps in the heat. The fire scorches the kitchen. The smoke ruins the rest of the house. A leaky pipe in the gas range? A carelessly placed rag? No one is around to say for sure.

     Life on the prairie disrupted by something so small. They gathered what the fire didn’t take and move into town. Maybe it’s better here. Maybe it’s what they wanted all along. Maybe it wasn’t an accident. Maybe it was insurance fraud. Maybe it wasn’t a fire at all and the kitchen just wore differently. The rest of the house was in decent shape for a place that didn’t have windows or doors. By no means livable, but I never felt like the structure was going to collapse on us.

     We lumbered through the grass back to the car and turned toward Cherokee. I looked back as we pulled away and could see a ghost in every entrance. The sagging facade resembled a face with its hollow, dark windows as eyes and porch with crooked rails as teeth.

     Cherokee would be no different. Even as a child, I got the impression that this town was only a shell of its former self. There’s the grocery store my great grandfather used to own. My family probably knows who runs it now, but from this side of the plate glass windows, it doesn’t matter. The road curves and there’s the old hospital. My mom was born there. Now the county clerk. A statue of a soldier stands lonely out front, waving to the empty street. Finally, we’re in downtown, all two blocks of it.

     Every window is dark with a closed sign at the door. Some stores will spring back to life tomorrow morning. The lights will come on and the gears of local commerce will begin to turn again. Other stores will remain dark for a long time; potentially forever. Or until the roof opens up and the cold light of day finds its way inside. But for the moment, Cherokee isn’t completely abandoned. And there’s one more place I’d be interested in seeing life.

     Winding through residential streets, there’s people mowing lawns, walking dogs, and having yard sales. This is why the town is closed: the population is enjoying the final hours of easy-does-it leisure before going back to work on Monday. But one house is completely still. No shadows move on the other side of the windows, nobody’s outside tending the garden, no kids playing in the sprinkler. I’d expect the muted symphony of the music of life to bleed through the walls, but it’s quiet. No dishes clattering in the sink, no TV shows, no radio, no voices.

     My great grandparents’ former home stands silent and still, but not in disrepair. The blooming flowerbed indicates that new owners have taken over, and I can’t help but wonder what it looks like inside. I probably wouldn’t even recognize it without pictures of my family hung all over the walls. But even if I could see inside, I would never step foot in my great grandparents’ house again. But that’s a natural consequence of the passage of time. You grow up, you move on, things get left behind. Such is the plight of Cherokee and all the other little towns scattered across the country. My family left, but the town still remains.

     It’s only dead from the outside perspective, very much alive to those within. It’s a lazy Sunday afternoon and the town is hiding indoors, away from the light of the sun. But Sam and I are here to get OUT. In the spirit of spontaneity, Sam suggested paying a visit to the Great Salt Plains. I left the agrestic melancholy behind and followed the road signs.

     I bounced over a washboard road and swerved saltwater-filled potholes to the crystal dig area.  It was muddy from today’s rain and the road was more water than road in some places. I worried about getting out, but we got in just fine, aside from hitting a single pothole.

     I had cleaned the car the day before, inside and out. That pothole splashed water onto the windshield and into the open windows. From this point on, there was always a bit of salt to be found inside the car. The outside was much worse and took forever to wash off.

     Sam marched to the very center of the dig area and stuck his hand in a shallow hole, filled with clear, still saline. He dug for crystals as I stood by. I had been here before and wanted to keep a recent cut I had gotten out of the saltwater. But I could only resist the temptation for so long before I was on the ground scooping out holes, producing dagger-shaped crystals from the mud. I came away with two solid ones and Sam found crystal after crystal in a large hole. As he dug them out, I wrote in the sand “THIS IS A GOOD HOLE!” for the next excavator.

     Leaving, we wound down the road trying to avoid getting stuck, until we were back on gravel. I had never been so thankful for such an awful road. Back in town, I tried to clean off the windshield and windows, but the saltwater was persistent. It seemed like a good time to hand things over to Sam, so I resigned myself to the passenger seat and wrote in my journal.

     As a passenger, I was burdened with the freedom of thought. I didn’t have to focus on the road, or navigation, or be aware of things like speed and gas mileage. I was given the opportunity to look around and think. I thought about the things I wanted to see tomorrow, the places I wanted to go, and the girl I wanted to see. We were going to Denver tomorrow on no more than a whim and a rumor of a cool bar. We had no other reason to be there, but it seemed like a reasonable ten hour detour, so why not? But before then, we were going to hike Black Mesa, the highest point in the state, meaning we’d have to spend the night at the closest free campsite. It was still four-and-a-half hours away

     I lost count of how many “CEMETERY” signs I saw, pointing to the final rests of passed members of forgotten societies on the prairie. These quartz headstones were all that were left of some of the settlements out here. One sign was different though: instead of promising another field of monuments to the dead, it offered something I had been seeking for a long time: “FREEDOM 12 MILES.” Only twelve miles to Freedom! Right here on the border of Kansas! Twelve miles later and we passed the sign indicating what direction you go to find Freedom.

     “Sorry, buddy. It looks like we won’t be going to Freedom today” Sam said as he drove past.

     I looked down the road, trying to catch a glimpse of Freedom, but it was another three or four miles. Too far away. I had expected that we would run into Freedom, that it was an inevitable destination. But no, Freedom is something you have to pursue. If you’re determined, you’ll find it. But in this experience, only the idea of Freedom exists. You just have to trust that it’s there, over those emerald hills and down the beaten road. I’d never know what it looked like. And it’s so obscure, I couldn’t even imagine it. If I ever came across it again, I’d know it. But the only way to see it is to find it. And the only way to find it is to follow it.

     The sun took longer to set with us chasing after it. The horizon was ablaze and the green grass of the prairie reflected its golden warmth. And now, it was dark. I traded off with Sam just after sunset in Forgan. Now it was my turn to set cruise control and hold the wheel straight for miles at a time. Passing Baker, then blowing through Hooker, then turning off just as the lights of Guymon came into view down an ill-maintained road; its only other traveler a skunk.

     No time to swerve around him, but I could avoid crushing him. He fit right in between my wheels, but the ungrateful bastard sprayed the underside of my car anyway. Mercy be damned. He got the muffler, which baked the spray and created a uniquely foul smell that crept into the car. For the next ten miles, I worried that the smell would linger forever and we’d carry the scent all the way to Oregon. I could replace a flat tire or swap out a bad headlight, but I couldn’t scrub the underside of my car any time soon.

     Outside of Guymon, we were onto another long, straight stretch of road, this one fifty miles long. The smell beneath the car began to subside, but was never gone completely. After going down five miles, a wave of anxiety washed over me. At a certain point on this road, I will be as far from civilization as I can get. What if something happens out here? We hit a deer, wreck the car, get sick-

     Settle down. The only anomaly out here is the presence of people, not the absence. No Man’s Land is a flat hell with no changes in elevation or scenery. A vast wasteland ripe for agriculture and ranching, according to those who tried to settle it. People deal with the isolation here every day. I can deal with it for forty five minutes. Could I deal with it for five days?

     Planned at the end of the trip was a hike through Pariah Canyon. Sam had been wanting to do this though-hike for awhile now, and I had hesitantly agreed to go. Five days, covering fifty miles of deep canyon carved by the Pariah River. A long hike with no communication to the outside world. Just food, water, and company shared by Sam and the two guys meeting us there; Colin and Tanner. I was reluctant at first, but I figured it might be fun.

     At the end of the fifty miles, we turned left towards Boise City, stopping into a gas station to stretch our legs. My filthy car smelled worse on the outside. First day on the road and the ride had lost it’s shine. It’s a good thing though. Neat and pristine Range Rovers and Raptors and Silverados don’t look like they’ve ever driven over anything other than pavement. Our ride, a 1997 Lincoln Town Car, was ready for anything. Dirt roads, gravel roads, two tire tracks in the grass… I would go anywhere there was something to be seen, even if this old luxury car wasn’t built for it.

     Exiting Boise City and rolling over a few more miles, we were in Felt; the southwestern most town in the Oklahoma panhandle. Down a deserted street at midnight, with dogs barking from their yards at the strange car, we pulled straight into the gravel parking lot of a modest picnic ground. It was the most trees we had seen in one place since sunset. It might be the highest concentration of trees in the county. We got EVERYTHING we thought we would need out. I brought my sleeping bag, camping bag, food, hygiene kit, anything I thought I might POSSIBLY need to survive the next six hours. After picking a spot to sleep and choosing a breakfast for tomorrow, I warmed up a can of corn on the camp stove. Seasoned, it was the best thing ever.

     Sam and I buzzed quietly with excited energy. This was our first night on the road! With everything that lie ahead, who knows what’s to come? I lay awake in my sleeping bag, writing in my journal by flashlight and occasionally staring up at the stars. It was the least light pollution you could get anywhere in the state, and the longer you looked, the more stars you saw. I put the journal down and closed my eyes. The hum of some machinery off in the distance finally lulled me to sleep.

THE HIGH POINT OF OKLAHOMA

     FELT, OKLAHOMA

     JUNE 6, 2022

     My eyes shot open as I lay still in my sleeping bag. The stars above that we had fallen asleep under were long gone. Low, gray clouds reflected the red lights of the nearby grain elevator. A cool breeze came in sharp across the open prairie. Rain incoming, surely. I could smell it. As soon as we felt drops, we sprang up and stuffed everything into the car: bags, blankets, breakfast and all. I passed out in the front seat for another three hours, anticipating a downpour. At 6am muted sunrise spread a warm glow over the golden fields surrounding the campsite. The ground was completely dry. I had a crick in my neck and wasn’t quite ready to cook breakfast, so we repacked the car and set out for Black Mesa. It was more long stretches of flat grazing lands that eventually gave way to scrub-covered fields and small mounds. The mounds became mesas and then we were at the trailhead.

     Breakfast was our first priority. I warmed up a can of diced potatoes, losing half of the can when I knocked my canteen cup off the stove. The canned hash would compliment it in taste, but not in looks. We ate our breakfast of seasoned mush and spoke with two Yankees who had approached us. One was hiking the highest point of every state, and had hit quite a few already.

     Usually, this kind of achievement takes a lifetime, and Black Mesa was just another line on his list. But to me, Black Mesa was something more. It was the highest point in my own home state. It would feel wrong to pass by it and not hike to the top. It’s four miles in, and four miles out. Seems simple enough. Right?

     I must’ve looked pretty damn goofy with my scarf wrapped around my head. I put on sunscreen as well, but why risk it? I had learned my lesson with sunburns on Wheeler Peak years ago. I wasn’t gonna make the same mistake this early on in the trip.

     The heat wasn’t intense in the early light of day, but the fact that there was no shade made it daunting. If it wasn’t the direct sunlight, it was the fact that I wasn’t used to this much walking. I had brought only my canteen, sunscreen, two fruit bars, and a bag of granola. More than enough to survive an eight mile hike. Water was my biggest concern. I had a filling breakfast, so food wouldn’t be an issue for a long time. I was mainly snacking on the granola for entertainment. The water however, was just one canteen’s worth. There were no rivers or streams anywhere nearby, and the higher the sun rose, the more I would sweat, especially without shade.

     Two miles in, just before the trail that ascended the mesa, there was a shaded bench and a box with bottled water inside.

     Midway down, this was a safe spot, even if you had to sit behind the structure for shade. I didn’t take the offering, determined to prove to myself that I could survive on one canteen’s worth of water, but I watched enviously as Sam emptied one of the free bottles into his own flask then into his mouth. After adequate rest, we started the grueling hike up the side of the mesa. The trail went upwards quickly. We stopped twice for rest on what probably wasn’t more than a quarter mile. I marched upwards, heaving from all the cigarettes and inactivity of the past few months, and the increase in elevation didn’t help much either. My thighs burned and I knew they would be sore after this.

     At the end of the winding trail, we were on top of the mesa with more flat scrub land to trudge through. We saw the yankees again, who were significantly more in shape than we and didn’t seem to see the trail as anything but a brisk morning jog.

     “It’s just another half mile!” Lying bastards. It was much more than a half mile’s trudge through dead grass and dead cacti and a dead breeze would come through, but not long enough or forceful enough to cool the sweat starting to bead on my back. And the view was just mesa. In any direction it looked like you were on the same flat land you came in through. We weren’t close enough to the edge to see beyond it, we just had to assume it was there.

     Finally, in the distance: the brown granite obelisk that stood marking the high point. We made it to the stone and I took cover in its shade. I rested a bit, then Sam and I signed our names in the paperback notebook of People Who Had Made It To The Top of Black Mesa. Now we were part of the club. Looking east, I knew the rest of Oklahoma lay in that direction. I wished I could see it, but it was just more damned grass.

     An older gentleman by the name of Stan approached and entertained us for a bit. I sipped my canteen in the shade and listened as he told us how many times he had done this trail and another trail and how tourists were ruining our national parks and to go check out the dinosaur tracks whenever we got done here. After a long one-sided conversation, we said our goodbyes and headed back towards the rim.

     Desperate to save time, I went off the trail. I watched my feet as I stepped over dry dirt and gray grass, around groups of prickly pear and dead cholla and the occasional adolescent juniper tree, watching and listening for the fatal rattle of a snake’s tail.

     I felt more in-tune with the land this way. I could see what the locals were working with hundreds of years ago, and what the first settlers encountered as they moved cattle and covered wagons westward. How it would be to be an old cowboy, moving slowly under the merciless sun hoping to find water before running out completely. Hoping to make it to the edge of the mesa and see lamplight in the growing dark, but no: right now it was hopeless. I intercepted Sam at the trail and figured I might’ve shaved four seconds off my walk back.

     Now for the downhill. It should be easy, but my legs shook as I tried to control my descent down the rocky path. We made it to the shady oasis and sat long enough to hear Stan pass behind us on his return trip. The next two miles were miserable winding down the least direct path I’d ever walked, boiling in the sun and ignoring my aching legs. By the end of it, I was stumbling, my thighs were so stiff. The glimmer of cars in the parking lot gave me the extra energy to push on, and after another half mile, I was sitting in the front seat of my Lincoln. There was more water in the back, but I couldn’t get up. Once I had the energy, I drained the rest of my canteen before filling up and chugging again. With new energy, we set out for the rumored dinosaur tracks east of here.

     After a few navigational hiccups, we found the creek the tracks were supposedly in. We stumbled down a short slope and found them with surprising ease. Sure enough, there were old footprints immortalized in the solid creek bed. An insignificant trek by an animal that had existed millions of years ago still imprinted at the base of a dry creek, only to be seen by people who knew it was here.  We retreated back up the slope and took off for a gas station. The one nearest by was back in Boise City, but Sam was adamant that we keep pushing west. “Not one step back,” he said. With a range of one hundred miles, we could make it to Clayton, New Mexico. But heading for Denver, we might not make it to a gas station at all.

     So, outside of Kenton we crossed the border into New Mexico and drove down the flat scrub lands that surround the Santa Fe Trail, forgetting Denver entirely. I wanted to get to the Taos area anyway. That’s where my sweetheart was.

     Fields, the occasional farm, and sage. Sage everywhere. This was the first major change of scenery. Not dramatically different from the panhandle, but now I felt like I was really in the desert.

     We made it to the gas station on fumes, and I charted our next course. We had two options: The low road, 412, which would take us directly to Springer, then we’d have to find our way to Cimarron, which wasn’t far off, or the high road, 87, which would take us to Raton before we’d have to drop down on 64, directly into Cimarron. The high road seemed more scenic, so I turned us in that direction and put on Johnny Cash.

     In the distance, a great raincloud trailed strings of gray tendrils across the landscape. With the sorry condition of my car, I wanted nothing more than to be caught in a shower. I watched the cloud as intently as I watched the road, hoping the road would turn towards the cloud or the cloud would drift towards us, but no. The cloud moved on before I could get underneath it, and a sunshower that lasted all of five seconds teased me. The car was still filthy, but at least it didn’t stink anymore.

     We passed through a tiny town called Des Moines. I cracked that Kerouac said the prettiest girls in the world lived in Des Moines and rubbernecked to see if he was right. He was definitely talking about Des Moines, Iowa, not this little prairie ghost town bordered by gently rolling hills.

     We listened to half of a Steve Earle album on the way to Raton, but in the parking lot of a gas station, I was desperately ready for something else. “Gunfighter Ballads and Trail Songs” kept us company as we blew down I-25, singing along to “Big Iron.” It would be another half hour down highway 64 to Cimarron. We passed pronghorn, construction workers, and an old red cowboy hat that I was tempted to ask Sam to turn back for.

     The only interesting thing on this road was some sort of NRA resort: a place to go as far away as you possibly could from society to hunt and shoot for a weekend. Sam and I looked on, befuddled, before pressing on past a shack midway down the road with “COLD BEER” painted on the side in big white letters.

     We rounded the corner into Cimarron and there wasn’t a damned thing to be seen. It was a “blink and you’ll miss it” type of place. I knew my date was somewhere around this town, but she wouldn’t be off work for another hour. We pressed on towards Eagle Lake through Cimarron Canyon. The yellow hills gave way to tall, green mountains that grew closer and lusher, vibrant with firs and pines. We had lost reception, but neither of us had noticed that the music had stopped playing. We were too taken in by the rocky creek alongside the road that sheer cliff faces dripped water into during the rainy season. But right now it was dry. At every campsite, there was a large “CAMPGROUND CLOSED” sign at the entrance. There had been fires burning through the state for the past few months, putting a damper on any camping, hiking, or any other outdoor activities in the area of Carson National Forest.

     In Eagle Lake, we opted to take the northern route to Taos, through Red River. My parents had taken me there as a kid and I wanted to go back and see if anything had changed.

     It had, but it had been for the worse. Red River was similar to how I remembered it, but not exactly the same. There were the same old tourist traps on the main drag, but off the drag you could see new developments for condos and apartments; presumably, timeshares.

     I love the idea of people getting away from the city: taking a break from the endless asphalt and noise of the concrete jungle, to get back to nature for a bit. Trees, wild animals, and the natural landscape that all of America once was, before the railroads, interstates, airports, and cul-de-sacs. For some, a condo is enough. All the comforts of home: toilet, sink, mattress, flatscreen TV. But just out the window is the endless wild of the American southwest, where the rest of us want to spend the night: under the stars and branches of the conifers, listening to crickets and flowing water, the ambiance only broken by the occasional coyote. But no, I wouldn’t be spending the night in such a blissful bed.

     After a compulsory visit to the Taos Cow, Sam and I headed uproad to snag a camping spot. Hopefully the same spot by the creek we had on our fateful Wheeler Peak trip from years ago. But this road had met the same fate: closed due to fire danger.

     Shit! What were we going to do now? I pulled us back into Taos proper so Sam and I could contemplate our options. He suggested pulling into a backlot a little ways away from the plaza, so I pulled in and started the longest and most painful walk I had endured since Black Mesa. My thighs were killing me. Sam thought we were a lot closer to the plaza, but we were, in fact, several blocks away. I had never been so pissed. The real insult was the empty parking spaces lining the plaza when we finally got there. I sat on the gazebo and focused all of my mental efforts on a solution. A hotel? On the second day?? No way, there’s got to be a cheaper- A teenager approaches me to ask for rolling papers. We apologetically said no and sent the teen away. After a bit more thinking and searching, it came to me:

     We’ve been looking for free campsites this entire time. What if we found a paid campsite that was open? Sure enough, Eagle Lake had a spot for us for ten dollars. And that price sure beat the hell out of the eighty or so we’d be paying for a hotel. I let my date know that we had figured something out and she said it’d only be a twenty minute drive from where she was, and she’d be off work shortly.

     I walked as fast as my legs could carry me back to the car and took off for Eagle Lake. I took the twists and turns as fast as I safely could through the southern route. Up the mountain, down the mountain, hugging the curves and laying on the gas for the straightaways. It had been too long since I had seen her last, and I was ready to be next to her again.

     I had missed the turn initially, believing that our camp was somewhere else, but after doubling back, we had found it. Down a straight road to a turn at a parking lot, then onto our spot. It was within view of the other campers, but I didn’t give a damn. Sam and I unloaded everything from the stuffed trunk. We had our luggage, sleeping bags, and a case of beer I had picked up in Oklahoma laid out on the concrete pad where we would spend the night. I was nervous as hell. Not at the idea of sleeping out in the open, but at the thought of seeing my pseudo-girlfriend for the first time in a month. I arranged and then rearranged my things until I got a text from her stating that she didn’t know where our camp was. I drove the car out to find her, but she had parked and walked to our spot from the other side of a fence. I made the short drive back, buzzing with that familiar nervous energy the whole way. It’s been a month. Would she feel the same way she felt in May? Would she be as excited as I was? It was too late now.

     As I pulled the car up, I could see her sitting next to Sam, the lucky bastard. Thirty or so days and hundreds of miles apart, and he laid eyes on her first. Savannah. The girl I fell too quickly for and couldn’t let go of. A familiar story, but she hung around.

     I parked and made a mental rehearsal of how I’d greet her. I got out and before I had even realized, she was leaning in through the passenger window, admiring the new dashboard. She leaned out of the car, and gave me a casual “howdy” from across the roof before moving back to the covered bench Sam and I had claimed.

     No dramatic run and embrace while the world spins and disappears as we were finally together again. Just “howdy.” I wasn’t mad. I was a bit relieved. She was never one for theatrics. I sat next to her and tried to make small talk, but it never felt like enough. I didn’t know what to say. Ready to do anything but sit and stumble, I suggested we go down to the lake.

     I drove us there and found a way down to the rocky shore, away from the fishermen. I shed my shirt and rolled up my pantlegs, carefully wading into the ice cold water, cursing the fact that I had forgotten my lake shoes in my bag. After wading out to knee depth and finding it too cold to go further, I came back onshore to dry off. Sam lead with the questions and I tried to put forth my own, but I still felt like a stranger. No handholding or hugging. We were completely foreign to each other. I just sat there awkwardly before changing into my new boots and the spare pair of pants that I had brought and led us back to the car. At camp, I made myself a cold canned dinner, then went for the beer. A few cans and cigarettes in, Savannah and I were getting along fine. I was still being coy, being in front of Sam and all, so I took the leap and grabbed my blanket. Savannah and I had moved downhill into the sage and rocky soil, laying out under the stars starting to appear in the growing night sky. From up the hill, Sam announced he was going to step away to find a bathroom and I took the opportunity as soon as he was remotely out of view: the long awaited kiss. I leaned in and it was ecstasy. An explosion of long awaited sensation. Naturally, I wanted more. So I took more. It went on like this for quite a bit. Sam silently returned and tucked himself into his sleeping bag. Down the hill, Savanna and I were a horny tangle of tongues and teeth. She invited me back to her camp, but I declined. I knew what her intention was, and I would have gladly taken it, but I didn’t want her to get her in trouble for bringing an unauthorized guest onto camp grounds. And who knew what kind of trouble I would get into for such a stunt.

     We went for a drive instead. Not finding much, we returned to where she had parked for more kissing and squeezing. We shared one more cigarette alone in the sagebrush, listening to a gentle breeze rustle the reeds by the lake’s shore, then resolved to meet in Santa Fe. It was late and I was tired, so I sent her on her way, impatiently awaiting our rendezvous the next afternoon.

     I crawled into my sleeping bag for the most hellish night I had indured in quite some time. It was too cold to sleep, so I just thought of her. She obviously still liked me, but how far did it go? Paranoid delusions ran through my head: she had a new partner. My last chance at love vanished as she disappeared with some stronger, taller, crazier man. I would lose contact and never hear from her again, cast once again into the romantic doldrums that lie between loves. I remembered how I felt after every other girl before her left me: sick to my stomach. Sick with the grief that someone I wanted to give everything to had gone from me, leaving my heart adrift in a sea of loneliness. Never before was a night so cold. I donned my peacoat, which I was saving for the Oregon coast, and I had pulled the blanket up from the sage. I wrapped a towel around my head, but the wind always found a way to cut into my exposed skin. And it was a nasty breeze too: the kind you can hear just before it hits you. All night, tossing, and turning, and thinking about where I’d rather be, what I’d rather be doing, and who I’d rather be with. She was probably sleeping in the same warm bed that I’d been invited to, and I was freezing my ass off in some mountain valley in New Mexico.

CALAMITY AND ECSTACY

     EAGLE NEST, NEW MEXICO

     JUNE 7, 2022

     The sun finally rose and the wind settled down. I probably got more sleep under the sun than I did under the stars.

     Some old man named David was talking to us, telling us about the good old days of camping here before the bureaucrats took over, and how he had been visiting this spot for the last however-many-years and his dead son and so on, ceaselessly. I slowly packed my things, dragging down a cigarette and ignoring the half-hearted craving for a morning beer. He finally got the point and left us, and we left camp.

     I passed the wheel over to Sam so I could catch up on journaling. At a gas station in Eagle Nest, I took a much needed piss and picked up a bunch of travel flyers. In the car, I started going over them.

     SANTA FE - ALBUQUERQUE. Alright, sure, Breaking Bad film tours, the rattlesnake museum; I’ve seen enough snakes in Oklahoma. Skiing, hiking, come spend your money here. The horse rides look cool, though. There’s one: National Museum of Nuclear Science and History.

     WAR EAGLES AIR (and auto) MUSEUM. I do love old planes and old cars. Where is this? Santa Teresa? Can’t be too far- On the border of Texas?? Not a chance in Hell, maybe next time.

     OLD TIME PHOTOS. This looks fun. Maybe Savannah would like it. This is too kitschy to pass up. “OPEN WEEKENDS AND BY APPOINT. IN JUNE. OPEN DAILEY [sic] FROM JULY 4TH THRU LABOR DAY.” I guess I’ll be coming back in July, they’re not open daily just yet. Get a load of the people on the back cover: these are real people and real families, re-enacting scenes from one of the most troubled and glorified periods of American history.

     The last pamphlet: VISIT MEOW WOLF. SANTE FE, NM. We’d be there regardless, so why not? It looks kinda fun.

     Backtracking through the mountain pass we had blown down yesterday, stuck behind a semi truck for half of it, we were once again in Arroyo Seco at the Taos Cow. Sam and I ordered breakfast burritos, and while waiting, the cottonwood buds floated in the still air like snowflakes. I watched the sky in wonderment, thinking of lonely winters in Oklahoma until our orders were up and we went to the back to eat. Posted up on a bench with the mountains in the distance and the cottony buds still floating in the air, it was the relaxation I needed after a night of fitful sleep.

     Onward to Santa Fe, I let Sam fight the traffic to our destination: a free WWII museum. We spent about an hour looking at the different patches, POW camp artwork, and guns from all the different conflicts young men and women from New Mexico were sent to fight in. It was a small room, but it was packed with knowledge and bloody history. Outside, we looked at the tanks and anti-aircraft cannons, then headed to the Sante Fe Plaza.

     I fought for parking, finally finding a space a quarter mile away, then walked to the open green area at the heart of old Santa Fe. My thighs were still a little sore, but not killing me like yesterday. We walked up and down San Francisco street, looking in the window at all the high-dollar jewelry, clothing, and art that someone like me could never afford.

     These places catered to the wives of midwestern cattle barons, who’d flown in with their husbands and rented an Audi, then Uber’d to the plaza to look at the “desert fashion” that was just the same as “midwestern chic,” but with Native American-ish patterns and enough turquoise to drive you nuts.

     It wasn’t for me. I was an exhausted twenty-four year old on a hastily arranged road trip with my best friend across the West. Unknowingly, I’d been saving for this trip for the last eight years. At the time I thought I was saving up for an emergency car repair, a down payment on a house, or some other insane expense. But really, it was all leading up to this. I could blow thousands of dollars here and go home with money to spare, but I had to stretch it to the coast, and then back. Gas was non-negotiable, food was mostly necessary, but everything else was optional. I would never balk at dropping a few bucks on a good time, but everything here was garbage with a big price tag. It was meant to be seen, not consumed. 

     We visited the “Original Trading Post” to scope out what kind of crap Santa Fe would try to shove onto us up close and personal. I walked out with a one dollar postcard of an alien family stranded in the desert, referencing Roswell. We walked down a street lined with film equipment trucks, catering trucks, and stingers running in every direction, then asked a security guard dragging a cigarette what they were shooting.

     It was some true crime show neither of us had ever seen nor heard of, so we moved on. We found a bookstore/coffee shop Sam had remembered from his last visit and stepped inside. I idly looked around, passing the best-sellers at the front, then stopped dead in my tracks as a bright yellow cover with black block lettering caught my eye. I magnetized towards it. “DESERT ORACLE. KEN LAYNE.” Eager to test the waters of this strange book, I cracked it open to a random page and read a single passage. “Dr. F. Bruce Russell claimed he fell into a tomb of giants in Death Valley later that same year.”

     I was immediately sold. I looked around a bit more for a few titles that had been evading me for months now, but settled on this single book.

At the counter, I handed it to a lady who looked like she had just clocked in. Sporting a blue dress and fresh makeup, she was appealing. Attractive and fit, she leaned over the counter and told me all about how the author had his own podcast and had come to speak at some place some time ago. She was very excited to see that I was interested in Ken Layne. I got the old familiar urge to flirt with her, but I knew damn well that I would never see this woman again. So on one hand, why bother? On the other, why not?

     No. I had someone to meet tonight and I didn’t need any distraction. I listened to her sing the praises of this book, then paid the nineteen-fifty two it cost. I had it, it was mine. Finally, a suiting companion for my trip through the American Southwest. Originally, I had brought along Kesey’s “The Last Go Around,” but had never found time to read it.

     I’ll indulge any vice but caffeine, so I ordered something light and posted up in a wobbly chair to read the first chapters of my new book. I read alone until Sam invited me on his endeavor to find his girlfriend a Mexican blanket. We visited the trading post again, then another tourist trap, then I got wrapped into the whole thing and insisted we go into a clothing store. There was a black hat for two hundred dollars. The same style of hat Marty Robbins wore on the cover of his most famous album. I couldn’t see myself in it, and after looking at a few more triple digit pricetags, I decided it was time to leave. Sam found a few blankets, but when checking out the price, they weren’t much cheaper.

     Savannah let me know that she was nearing Santa Fe, and with the London fog long finished and the caffeine settling in, I was suddenly aware of how hungry I was. I hadn’t had anything of substance since the second half of that burrito on the way here.

     Sam and I grabbed the car and moved on to a different parking spot near “Cowgirl.” We ordered a margarita each and I let Sam read a bit of my new book. I sat and waited as the minutes ticked slowly along and I expected to see Savannah’s car pass by any second now. It was a long wait, but eventually she walked in and I waved her down. We ordered a plate of nachos and another round of drinks, then moved the car back to the Plaza so we could drink at a brewery called “Desert Dogs.” Up the stairs and into an open room, the TV behind the bar was playing the afternoon news. High temperatures reaching the upper eighties, but it still felt hotter here on the second floor.

     There was a tabletop ring-and-hook game that had enough sides for everyone to try their hand at simultaneously. The first and second try were a bust, but on the third I got the ring over the hook through nothing more than dumb luck. Foolishly, I kept going. I tried so many times I had to give up before I embarrassed myself further. The lesson learned: quit while you’re ahead.

     We snagged a pool table where Savannah and I lost to Sam, then played a game of table shuffleboard where no one was keeping score or understood how the game was played. At this point, it didn’t matter. We were drunk. We’d had enough drinks here, then walked across Galisteo street to a true dive bar adorned with posters from WWII and a wicker motorcycle hanging above the wall. A big sign reading “CASH ONLY” deterred us and we went on the hunt for the next bar, “the Matador.”

     Sam and I followed Savannah down the street and through a door and down some stairs and down a narrow hall to a door that I could hear punk music on the other side of, but it was locked. This is the back door, so where is the front? Streetside, we found a staircase illuminated by a blue light and upon opening the heavy metal door at the bottom, we knew we had found it. 

     The Matador was a dimly lit black room covered in strange art, stickers, and polaroids. A yellow sign with green letters read “cash bar,” just the same as the last one. This place was too cool to pass up, so Sam and I immediately dug through our wallets, taking inventory of how many ones we had between us. Before we could total up our cash, Savannah had already asked directions to the nearest ATM, and with the bartender’s directions, we were back on the street, into the fading sunlight.

     I pulled out sixty dollars. More than enough for this bar, but I always take a little extra for the next time I find myself scrambling for cash. Everyone else pulled out some twenties, then we returned to the bar for our first round: two PBRs and a gin and tonic for the lady. Savannah found a stranger to talk to as Sam and I tried to figure out just what the hell was playing on the TV. Halfway through the can, I started to feel my beer and all the alcohol that preceded it. The pictures on the TV were unintelligible. The music was incomprehensible, and not just because it was punk. I could hear what Savannah and her new friend were talking about right next to me, but trying to recall any of the conversation is impossible.

     A man came downstairs with a case of water, then retreated back up just to return with another one.  Sam and I hopped out of our seats and approached him.

     “Hey, do you have any more freight to move down? Can I help you with anything?”

     The man spoke in very relaxed and slow tones. “Oh, no, this is it. But I appreciate the gesture, man.” He stuck his hand out. “I’m Frank Matador, the owner of this bar. I really appreciate that, man. You don’t get that kind of kindness anymore. I’ll tell you what, are you guys together?”

     Frank retreated behind the bar and leaned over to the bartender as we reclaimed our seats.

     “The next round for these guys is on me.”

     Even the bartender looked surprised. Maybe this kind of thing doesn’t happen that often here.

     “Where are you guys from? Are you from around here?”

     “No, we’re Okies. From Norman, Oklahoma. She’s from the City, but she’s spending her summer in Cimarron.”

     “Ohh, Oklahoma! I’ve been thinking about opening a bar in Oklahoma. And OKC is a pretty cool place. I just don’t know what the punk scene is like there.”

     I finished my beer and I was pretty far gone. I let Sam take over the conversation from this point. I don’t remember everything they said, except for them vehemently trashing Texas and Texans. I think Frank left, promising to return, and I stumbled out for a cigarette. Sam joined me out on the now dark streets.

     On the way to the car for the pack we had left, a man called out to us from across the street. He was joking that we were on our way to smoke some weed. We said “no, just cigarettes!” and laughed with him. Then he asked if we had any weed we could sell him.

     Back to the bar. The room spins. The music deafens. Sam’s talking to some guy and Savannah’s still talking to her new friend. I’m in the can. Fuck! No toilet paper. I burst through the door and resolve to dry out for awhile. I come up to the bar for a water and Sam pulls me aside to tell me my date just ran upstairs.

     Oh, shit. Alright. I stumble up the stairs and there she is, sitting on the sidewalk against the wall with that “I saw something I didn’t want to” stare. I planted myself next to her and asked what was up. She explained as strangers passed us by, neither of us paying the other any mind.

     I pulled a red bandanna from my pocket and offered it to her tear-streaked cheeks. I told her funny stories and gave her a cigarette, and just like that- she was all smiles again. She gave me the bandanna and went back down for another drink. Sam came up and I shoved the pack into his hand. We smoked and talked, then I got caught up talking to a guy who dove into water towers for a living. He recognized some chick who joined into our conversation, and I remember that neither of them were from Santa Fe.

     My head was still swimming. I’m back in the bar. Sam introduces me to the guy he was talking to. He’s a film guy, a location scout. Found a hallway for “Stranger Things.” This guy is the real deal: a valuable connection in the vast but necessary film network. I try to explain the premise of my upcoming short film to him, then grab Savanna’s seltzer from the bar, chug it halfway, and then ask, “Oh, that wasn’t yours, was it?” to my new friend. I guess I wasn’t drying out anymore. We could stay here all night talking to the congenial strangers of Santa Fe.

     Now I’m at the other end of the bar, sitting next to Alex and drinking water. He’s twenty two, but grew up fast. Left home in highschool and he’s been on the move ever since. Lives a very “you are where life takes you” kind of life. Optimistic. My heartbeat is in my ears. Savanna’s next to some guy. She’s laughing. I’m watching. She nods. We go. Upstairs. To the street. She grabs.

     We kiss.

     We stroll down to Water Street and I laugh.

     “Is that your new boyfriend?”

     “Ugh, no! He’s a Navy guy. I’m not really about that.”

     “What? He seems like just your type! A muscle-bound patriot who served our country. Why not?”

     “No! I would never. I couldn’t.”

     I teased her some more, then we ducked into a small plaza tucked into the middle of the block. We sat and kissed some more, ignoring the security guard sitting nearby until he told us a musician had just been announced dead. We both said a few words about how sad it was and went right back to making out.

     Back on the street, we rounded the corner and I pressed her up against the wall for one more kiss. We kept walking, then she asked that infamous question.

     “So, what are we? Are we exclusive? Or…? What’s going on?”

     My heart skipped a beat before beating at double speed. I had to catch my breath before I could answer. I floundered.

     I wanted to be her man. For us to be ours only. But with us being so far apart for the summer, I felt saying as much would come off as clingy and rushed. So I gave non-answers and nonsense all the way to the car. We sat down and I asked what she wanted. She didn’t know either. Really, she wanted to know if we had any rules.

     Fuck, I don’t know! I wanted to know too, but I never wanted to ask. We talked for awhile. I tried to balance the rational with the emotional and to compromise and explain and pull her on top of me and kiss because I wasn’t ready to confront this yet and we had teased each other so much that something else was still on our minds.

     My mind was clear enough, I put it in gear and she booked a hotel room. I parked crookedly on the side of the street, ran in, grabbed Sam, left a tip that wouldn’t even begin to cover our bartender’s hospitality, then drove us all back to where Savannah had parked. I tossed Sam the keys and told him not to wreck it. I’d text him the hotel room number when I was done.

     Now it was just me and Savannah. She drove us down Cerrillos in her Suzuki, blasting music and running reds, acting like her night hadn’t even begun. It didn’t matter how she drove, every cop in town just passed us in the opposite lane, full lights and sirens.

     After jumping the curb to avoid a construction zone, we were at the hotel. We knocked on the door, and the night manager explained that we had actually booked our room for the next day, and not tonight.

     And there was no vacancy.

     Oh, shit. We didn’t have a place to sleep. Sam got us Frank’s contact info, so I texted Frank to see if he knew where we could crash. He called me, promising me a place to sleep. He’d meet us here and lead us there. After all the beer and water, I had a more urgent need to handle, and no bathroom in New Mexico is open past ten p.m. After a fruitless drive around the block, I had to pee next to a dumpster, out in the open.

     Frank rolled up with two big bottles of water, just what I needed, and led us to the “place” without revealing any hint as to what it was or where it was, aside from being a “safe spot” and a “cool” place. Savannah tailed his car down back streets into a neighborhood.

     It had occurred to me midway through the drive that Frank could easily just lead us out into the desert, strip us at gunpoint, and bury our bodies before taking off with our wallets.

     But it was unlikely. Frank seemed like a genuinely good guy, and he would go as far as needed to take care of his own. And I’m proud to know someone in another state hates Texas just as much as I do, so Frank was solid.

     Savannah was starting to drag. I could see it in her face. This was getting ridiculous and downright desperate. Frank led us into a big dog park. I relentlessly thanked him and assured him that I would call him if things started to look hinky. He left and it seemed like Savannah was ready to leave too. I tried to bring up what was said earlier, but she insisted she was too tired to talk. I desperately wanted to know what we were and what was going on, but I was tired too.

     We met Sam in a parking lot on Cerrillos, and I hugged her and made her promise to text me when she got back to Cimmarron. I drove to the Albuquerque “Kampgrounds of America” as Sam caught me up on the rest of his night. He said that he heard gunshots from where he was at before the cops started a manhunt for the shooter. Funny how we witnessed two different sides of the same event.

     I was too tired to drive, but I pressed on anyway, hoping Albuquerque wasn’t much farther. My sleepy eyes crossed and the road smeared by going into town. We pulled up to the KOA and the gate was closed. I was too tired and hungry to do any more driving, so I backed in behind a semi truck and slept in the front seat. Even at two A.M., it’s fucking hot in Albuquerque.

     I slept for an hour. Behind closed eyes trying desperately to sleep, I stressed out about Savannah. She was just as tired as I was and had three times the distance to go. She’d fall asleep and drive off the road. So many mountain passes and switchbacks from Santa Fe to Cimarron. This was my fault. I had kept her out so late. How would I explain this to her parents? Would I ever-

Get a grip! She’ll get home fine. I had other things to worry about: like our relationship status. What were we? Are we open? Closed? Confused? It wouldn’t matter if I never got that text. I expected to hear from her around five, and it wasn’t even four. All I wanted to do was call her and apologize. I just wanted to hear her voice and know that she was okay. But I resisted and settled into a silent panic in the front seat. I could think of nothing other than how awful I felt.

     This was the bottom: the curb outside the Albuquerque KOA.

HUNGOVER HEART

     ALBUQUERQUE, NEW MEXICO

     JUNE 8TH, 2022

      I stayed up until she texted me, finally, then fell asleep for another two hours. I slept like a rock knowing she was safe. The familiar cool of morning crept in and woke me up around seven, and by eight, we were on the move again.

     I found a grocery store bathroom to piss in, then drove to Sonic for a cheap breakfast. Albuquerque is an urban hellscape, built in the desert as a move of defiance. The six lane street that used to be Route 66 is now lined with fast food joints and RV lots. The front yards of quiet houses are rocks and sand. Sidewalks don’t exist, and bus stops are non-existent.

     I found a neighborhood to eat my breakfast sandwich in, then changed shirts, brushed my teeth, and wondered what my coworkers were doing right about now. It didn’t matter. I was rejuvenated. I drove us straight to the National Museum of Nuclear Science and History, then waited outside for the doors to open.

     The woman at the counter gave us a verbal guide to the museum and advised us to see the outside stuff before it got hot. Out the back door we went, looking at mock ups of atomic bombs and thermonuclear warheads. I knocked on one and laughed, pretending that the United States didn’t hold this kind of armageddon over the rest of the world during the cold war.

     Back inside, out of the growing heat, we went through the rest of the exhibits, from the birth of the bomb to nuclear energy. Occasionally, my mind would wander back to last night and I’d lose track of where I was.

     The sun sets on humanity as my relationship comes to an end. The missiles fly and the bombs drop and every cell of me is cooked and torn apart, being scattered across the desert by the nuclear blast. If this really were the end, I wouldn’t care if I was blown away by an atomic bomb. God, give me anything but heartache. I can see it now: Sav and I would drag our feet around old Santa Fe until she’d turn to me and tell me that she wasn’t ready, or we didn’t belong together, or something awful and I’d go mope on the curb by the Matador as she walked away for good. The tears would well in my eyes as the flash lit up the horizon and by the time the first tear hit the ground the whole city would be reduced to ashes and adobe-colored dust, and I’d leave behind nothing but charred bones and a broken heart. Even this was preferable to bearing the weight of the pit in my stomach and enduring the wrenching of my heart. I just wanted to be near her again and know that everything was okay. Sam and I had seen everything there was to see here in this museum of life and death, but we still had so much time to kill.

     Out into the desert air, we cruised old town Albuquerque. New skyscrapers mixed with old. The whole thing was a discordant jumble of history and urban revival. I hated it. And when I couldn’t stand it anymore, I headed north, asking Sam to find a cool spot for us: a river, or lake, any place with water. Up highway fourteen, he found that all the spots were closed. Resigned to our dry and hot fate, Sam and I drove up the Turquoise Trail, listening to King Gizzard’s album, “Eyes Like the Sky,” from first track to last.

     I played the opening track when I first slipped on my new boots back in April. From the moment I saw them, I knew these black snub-toe ropers would carry me across the country. The most important thing you could invest in is a good pair of boots. And these were perfect. A little tight at first, and still a little tight now, but I was starting to feel comfortable in them. We rode through the desert, smoking cigarettes and listening to this modern day acid western. The sand, sage, and hills passing us by as we took the scenic route to Santa Fe. Sam had booked us a hotel earlier, but check-in wasn’t until three. It was barely noon.

     We parked by the plaza, expecting to find good Mexican food for lunch, but all the good places were closed. We settled on a burger joint instead. My mind was still hyper-analyzing last night’s conversation. Sam said Norman was flooding. Lucky bastards. I was sweating, it was hot, I could barely finish my burger: either out of nervousness or from my stomach shrinking from the road. We sat on a bench in the plaza under a tree with plenty of shade. I’d read a bit of “Desert Oracle,” then people-watch, then obsess about what I was going to tell Savannah. Once I had a conclusive answer, I’d go back to reading, just to doubt myself and start the cycle over.

     I had no fucking clue what I wanted, I just didn’t want to turn her off. Move in too fast and you’ll seem clingy. Move in too slow and you’ll seem disinterested. There’s no way to win! I did this until two thirty: time to head to the hotel. Sam checked us in and I brought all of my shit up to the room. Bag, beauty box, cooler, etc… I dumped it all on my bed. A bed. The sight of a bed and a shower was unfamiliar. I had invited Savannah up to Santa Fe when she texted me this morning. She texted me just now letting me know she was on her way.

     Shit, I gotta get ready. I reek! I rested in bed, letting Sam have the first shower. After taking mine, I lay awake for another few hours. I tried desperately to sleep, only passing out for a minute. A spam call jerked me awake, and I was up for good. So I just lay awake, stressing out and fantasizing:

     She would walk in and say “hello.”

     “Hello.”

     I’d grab her by the waist and she’d grab me back.

     “Been a long time, hasn’t it?”

     “It has.”

     Then we’d take each other by the lips and the rest of the afternoon would be lost. The scene replayed in my head until my phone buzzed next to my head.

     Before I could read the “what room are you in?” text, I was on the balcony waving to Savannah. Sam finished his cigarette and took his cue. I tossed him the keys, and then it was just me, Savannah, and a mattress. Finally.

     I don’t know how much time passed. I just remember how I spent it. When we were done, she apologized for last night. Her, apologizing to me! After I had dragged her around Santa Fe until the latest hours of night.

     Everything was alright. The bombs weren’t falling and the world wasn’t ending. No nuclear fire reducing us to ashes and whispered nothing. We got what we needed and I had assumed that everything was resolved. She suggested Indian food. I accompanied her and didn’t even make it through my appetizer. I felt bad ordering anything at all, I was so stuffed. We talked like we hadn’t been hundreds of miles apart for a month. Like we never lived through the mess that was last night. I never brought up what I wanted to, I suppose I already had the answer I needed. By the way she held me and kissed me, I could tell she was happy.

     We returned to the hotel for one more rampant session of love-making, then I fell asleep in her arms. She woke me up when Sam knocked on the door, then I fell right back asleep. The first night of actual rest, after braving the cold streets of Albuquerque and the fierce winds of Eagle Nest.

TRANSPORTED

     SANTA FE, NEW MEXICO

     JUNE 9TH, 2022

     I woke up with Savannah in my arms. The room was still quiet. Everyone else was asleep. It was just me. I let my mind go blank and enjoyed the moment until the rest of the room stirred, then we packed up and went to breakfast at Weck’s.

     I felt hungover, despite having nothing to drink the night before. We all booked tickets to Meow Wolf, then Sam and I made fun of the “Paris cafe” interior decor of this American/Mexican restaurant. While paying the ticket, I talked to the owner of the place. He had been to Oklahoma before. He’d come during a tornado. What better time to come?

     He pointed me in the direction of the mysterious stairs of the church downtown, then I walked out, forty or so bucks poorer. The thing with the stairs is, legend has it, a man came in from the desert, constructed a staircase for this church without driving a single nail, then disappeared. Jesus was a carpenter, so naturally it’s assumed this mysterious stranger was Christ himself. Now, the church charges you to see the stairs and nobody is allowed to walk its hallowed steps.

     On the way to Meow Wolf, I opened up the small metal tin I had sitting in the glovebox. I found that it was empty.

     “Sam! Did you take my edible??”

     “You had an edible?”

     I must’ve forgotten my special cargo at home, but Savannah offered her vape pen to anyone who wanted it. Walking from where we parked, away from the crowded parking lot, I took a drag and entered the line for the exhibit. I signed our signature in chalk, “The Okies,” with a cowboy hat above, and after a quick security check and a verification of our reservations, we were in.

     Meow Wolf is hard to describe. Words couldn’t do it justice. It’s a psychedelic art installation made for people on mushrooms. I was mostly sober, but it was still fun. I told Sam that we’d find him when we had seen everything, then Savannah and I went off on our own. First through a fish tank, then into a narrow hallway filled with abstract and haunting art. I enjoyed the various rooms, each one different from the last. After exploring for an hour or so, we found a place to sit in the trunk of a tree. People would walk by and go “aww,” seeing us sitting and holding each other in this mind-bending experience, then one lady asked, “are you temporary? Or real?”

     I thought for a split second.

     “We’re all temporary, aren’t we?” The lady laughed and went on her way.

     We’re all temporary. This is the only life we have, so why not enjoy it? Do something stupid! Fall in love, make mistakes, escape the ever impending ticking of the clock that is death coming to take your ass out at any time, unannounced. We’ve only got so long anyway, even if we do live a long, and full life, so why not?

     In an alleyway, I pressed a button and a message on a screen appeared: “cultivate your inner child.” Savannah did the same, getting a much more ominous message: “something is following you. And it’s getting closer.”

     Death. One day, you will close your eyes for the last time and there will be nothing. Each day, we live counting the seconds until we go. It may be when you’re eighty. It may be when you’re eighteen. 

     It’s something that I struggled with, especially in 2020. Between the pandemic and the political shitshow, it felt like the end of the world. I wasn’t ready to die yet: I was just starting to enjoy life. There was so much to see, so much to do. And to have that callously stolen from me for no good reason was the greatest injustice I could ever face. As a rotting mass of flesh in the ground, I would be indifferent. But as a living body in a hospital bed, bleeding out or struggling to breathe my last breaths, it was unfair. Your last moments spent wishing life was different. All the things you could have done, all the things you could have seen. But no. Everything you had so far wasn’t enough. Everything I had fought for as an activist. Everything I had written about as a journalist. Everything I had done as a person: It wasn’t enough.

     There’s always more to see. Always more to do. So do it. Chase that high. Drive into that sunset. Feel those feelings and experience the insanity of this world as it was meant to be experienced. Lay on your deathbed thinking, “I’ve seen enough. I’ve done it all.” Life is precious, especially your own. So live life without inhibition or second thought, because when you reach the abrupt end, you never get a second chance.

     Darkness. Void. Nothing. We’re in a dome adorned with animal eyes. She asks me which one my favorite is. I point to a green eye right above us, and she says that’s her favorite too. People pop their head in. “What the fuck?” They duck out. We laugh and enjoy our strange solitude, under the eyes of so many animals, watching. But I had never felt so alone and intimate in a space, the eyes seeing us hold each other and meet their different cold gazes. We had seen it all and it was time to go.

     We returned to the lobby, the unfamiliar real world just beyond the glass doors. Sam joined us and I stopped by the gift shop for a sticker and a “SORRY, WE’RE HIGH” sign: well worth the money.

     Savannah and I dropped Sam off at the book store and took off in no particular direction. We drove to Camel Rock and parked by the trail. As Savannah was finishing her cigarette, I saw a wave of sand get picked up by the wind. I tried to roll the window up, but was powerless against the dust. It blew directly through the narrow crack, and after a moment of wincing, we both broke out into laughter. We took the trail to the desert anomaly, and she casually observed “rock.” It kinda did look like a camel, sort of.

     We walked a secluded trail, then took off down random roads again. Driving through a secluded neighborhood on the outskirts of Santa Fe, I thought this was the Beverly Hills of the desert. Huge houses sat a quarter mile from each other down a blacktop road that transitioned to gravel. I followed it until we found a big lot I could turn around in. We shared cookies and kissed, and upon hearing the sound of thunder, I made for the security of a paved road.

     A desert storm was rolling in. The skies turned gray and the rain came down gently. It stopped as soon as it started, washing the filth from the top of my car to the bottom, making it look filthier still. We found our way back to Santa Fe, then drove down the Turquoise Trail. We rode in silence, just enjoying each other’s company. I wanted to take her to a kitschy attraction I saw yesterday, but five o’clock was fast approaching. Sam and I had to be on the road soon if we wanted to make it to Arizona by tonight: time was running out. I rolled through a village and parked by a secluded cemetery adjacent to the railroad outside of town.

     We walked in and stepped through the sand and stone to the fence on the other end of the graveyard. I held her as a dead breeze broke the dead silence of the bone farm. Some graves were old, really old. And some were new, new enough that toys were left on the headstone. I winced and walked us back. She knew as well as I did that it was time to go. Back on the trail, she said “I like spending time with you.” The feeling was mutual. Dusty wind blew across the road.

     “What’s on your mind?” she asked.

     “Just… Replaying recent events.” I said.

     She laughed and we drove the rest of the way to Santa Fe in silence. I tore the pictures we got in a booth at Meow Wolf in half, one side for her, an identical side for me. We shared one more cigarette before she changed into shorts in my backseat.

     “Did you get what you needed?” I asked.

     “Yes… Did you?”

     “Yes- Well. I’ll need more when I come back through in late June. But I got what I need for now.”

     As soon as the door closed and she walked away, I put on “Don’t Chase Me Around.” Now it was down to me and Tucker, the plastic turtle that had been hidden in the backseat since I bought the car. He was a stowaway on every journey I had made until this point. Sam found him and insisted he make this journey as well. He sat on the dashboard in front of the clock as I backed out. Savannah hopped out of her car and ran towards mine.

     What was this? Would she come back for one more good makeout sesh before we went our separate ways? Would she confess her true feelings? No. She thought she left her phone in my car. She found it in hers and I pulled away. I leaned out the window and yelled “hey!”

     She leaned out her window and I formed my hands into a heart. A confession of my true feelings? Or just a silly gesture to break the tension of parting ways? I hit Cerrillos and weaved through traffic, singing along and smoking. This was no time to be sad! Be happy! I made it here, I saw her, and I’m still going. The next destination is just ahead. We’re still going! I circled the bookstore until Sam came out and we were back on the road. I had a cigarette lit for him already, then I lit another for myself.

     We pulled into the turn lane to turn south onto St. Francis Drive. I spotted my date’s unmistakable red Suzuki pull up to our left. I said to Sam, “check that out. I think that chick’s digging on us man.” We all waved one final goodbye to each other. Blessed serendipity. Right place and right time; it was meant to be. I floored the gas and took us towards our next destination. From the passenger seat: “that was the biggest smile I had ever seen.” I was lucky enough to see it too.

     Our momentum was stunted outside of Albuquerque by a traffic jam. We chained cigarettes, bitched about the slowdown, and listened to music. We waited impatiently until we were past the tow truck and highway patrol vehicles. After that, I slammed the gas and nosed us West, further west toward Austin, Las Vegas, the coast, my ex, and eventually Pariah Canyon.

     I pulled into a gas station somewhere in the desert. I let Sam take the wheel and journaled my experience in Santa Fe as we cruised down the former Route 66. How could I sum up everything that had happened in the last twenty four hours? Meow Wolf was too psychedelic to remember, and Motel 6 was too exciting to forget, but there’s no need to detail that here. As for Meow Wolf, I remember a distinct sense of contentment. The world could be ending outside, the ground opening up from beneath us, or Chinese missiles devastating the desert around, and I would have been just fine. My senses were overloaded and my sole focus was her, watching from a distance as she played with the laser harp in a dark, foggy room. This could be the end, but I was happy.

     It was getting late. The rocky landscape had given away to complete darkness. Bob Dylan and Townes Van Zandt kept us company, but Ken Layne put me to sleep. Ten miles later and we were turning off onto a campground. The park itself was closed, so we turned into a gravel lot and got ready to rest for the night. Sam slept in the backseat while I slept in my sleeping bag, out under the stars. For a moment, I worried about the wildlife. I don’t know what inhabits the wilderness of Arizona: Bobcats, bears, space aliens?? That damned podcast had infiltrated my subconscious as I slept. The stars shone brightly above, and I imagined little black triangles cutting through the unbroken light.

PIT

     OLD CANYON ROAD, ARIZONA

     JUNE 10TH, 2022

     Awake by daylight: 5:02 Arizona time. 6:02 for the rest of the timezone. I crawled out of my sleeping bag to stretch my legs and noticed a “NO CAMPING” sign behind us that we had missed coming in, confirming my suspicions that this wasn’t a place we could bed down for the night. Under the stars, I was half afraid that a park ranger would come and evict us, but once I was asleep, my worries had dissipated completely.

     Now I was awake, mostly, sitting on a rock and eating Pop-tarts, reading Desert Oracle. After a bit of water and a cigarette, I was energized once again. I took us into the north-eastern corner of Flagstaff for gas, then started the long and desolate drive to the Grand Canyon.

     No trees anywhere, just reddish dirt, scrub brush, and two lane highway. We passed an abandoned motel on the southern outskirts of Gray Mountain. It was too good to pass up, so I pulled into the parking lot for a few photos.

     The whole thing was painted: red, purple, blue, all kinds of fantastic colors. In the center of it all was a purple eye that reflected red mountains under the night sky. There I am on the balcony of the second floor, foot on the railing, leaning against a post. A big pair of black Ray-Bans sit above a serious, scowling mouth, but my face betrayed my feelings: I thought it was fascinating. Pulling away, the backside of the motel office read “AMERICAN RENT IS DUE.”

     Suppose the writing on the wall is right: we’re on Dine land. You could say the government owns the state parks, and the ranchers the fields, but someone else has imminent domain. They’ve been inhabiting this desert since long before the first settlers set foot on what is now the “United States.” A group of people who are in-tune with the land, who know every hunting ground, every shady spot, and have a rich history and complex tradition. Why don’t I know their names? Their history? Has the education system failed? Or has it succeeded in erasing these “savages” from history? They’ve been here for thousands of years, yet I don’t know a thing about them or their ancestral land. 

     And here I was, rolling across it at top speed. I merged into the opposite lane to pass a truck, and almost got hit by approaching traffic. I swerved back into the right lane and laughed like a madman.

     I nudged my terrified passenger, “I’ve almost gotten us killed only once so far, so we’re doing good!”

     Sam forced out a laugh. After a few more miles, we went through a roundabout and turned onto the road that would take us to the southern rim of the Grand Canyon. A sun-faded sign read “Grand Canyon Vehicle Fee $35.00.”

     It wasn’t unreasonable, and we had come all this way, so why not? We pulled over to take inventory of our cash and I thanked God that I pulled out that extra twenty. We had just enough, but there was still thirty miles of road ahead. Every few miles was an empty “INDIAN JEWELRY” tent to break up the scrub brush and pines. The desert gave way to forest, and suddenly, we were there.

     The line to pay took forever, but they accepted card, making the cash scramble half an hour ago fruitless. And we’d need that cash at our next destination, so it was no issue when an old park ranger took my card and asked where we were headed. We told him and he suggested a few other national parks on our route to the coast. He returned my card, gave me the green light, and let us through.

     I parked as close as I could to the overlook trail and cracked the windows. I looked over and the passenger window was still up. Sam got out and pressed the glass between his palms and shook it downwards. The whole pane fell into the door. It caught me off guard and I let out a laugh.

     “Shit. I’ll stress out about that later.”

     We started walking towards the rim, just a few yards away. So close, but beyond eyesight. I’d been here before, but Sam had not. I was eager to see what his reaction would be to the sunken centerpiece of the west.

     We approached the rim and he was very casual. I couldn’t gauge his reaction, but I remembered how I felt the first time I saw it at nine years old: I was wonderstruck. It’s the farthest distance between two solid masses I’d ever seen. Between this rim and the one opposite was miles of open space, hazy with the density of the heat, too far to comprehend the gap between. I was too young to realize the age and wonder of such a natural anomaly, but I could appreciate its beauty then as I saw Sam was doing now. But we wouldn’t share the moment alone; there was a crowd of noisy French-speaking tourists surrounding us. I leaned against the railing and looked out into the vast void that is the Grand Canyon. The red, pink, and gray shades lay stacked above the Colorado River. Two young men skirt the fence and head closer to the rim. I thought it was unfair because I couldn’t go around the fence, but then again, it’s just a fence. I could go around if I wanted, but it might’ve been in place for good reason. Suddenly I remembered a story of some rock jumper falling into the canyon. And it would sure ruin my morning to see these ballsy brothers tumble in as the rest of their group watched in horror. But, the selfie they were going to take would no doubt be an indestructible and notable testament to how bold they were when visiting the Grand Canyon. Was it worth the risk?

     I didn’t care and I didn’t stick around to find out. The cacophony of the crowd was annoying me. I flanked to the other side of the tower, which was unfortunately closed, and found an empty and quiet spot. I sat on the edge of the rim, without fence or railing to stop me, and looked out into the open abyss. I took a picture specifically to show people that I was there. And now I was hardly better than the two brothers at the overlook. Though I wondered: Whose picture was better?

     The sun was starting to get high and car came to mind. I retrieved the Lincoln, drove us to a different overlook, and found a spot in the shade to work. Here too, all was quiet. I stripped the interior trim off of the door and found the culprit: a nut had loosened, separating the window from the elevator. I cut my fingers trying to hold the screw on one side of the assembly and thread the nut on the other side. There was a metal strip of panel running right through where I was working, creating a giant game of “Operation.” The door didn’t buzz when I hit the edge, thankfully. But when the door was all back together, I had a few bloody fingers. Sam had returned to the car and by the time I put my tools back in the trunk, he seemed like he was as ready as I was.

     Sam sounded pretty impressed, this being his first time and all. Even on the way, he’d catch a glimpse of the canyon through the trees and make an exclamation about its size. I was a little bored: yeah, it’s beautiful and huge and a must-see national park, but I had been here before. My grandpa took me when I was about nine. But I remembered how I felt when I saw it for the first time, and that’s why I didn’t mind making the diversion.

     I passed the wheel to Sam and put on the album “Gravity X” as he weaved through the forest towards Tusayan. We passed “Raptor Ranch,” or, as I had known it, Bedrock City. Regrettably, we did not go inside for the gifts, film, or 5 cent coffee advertised on Fred’s Cafe.

     From what I remember, the park is a dilapidated live-size model of the cartoon town of Bedrock. You could go inside every building, sit in a primitive car, pose with your favorite character, or slide down a dinosaur’s back, just like in the show. But at its heart, it’s nothing more than another ancient roadside attraction. Maybe the only attraction keeping this town alive. Maybe a staple of the “Grand Canyon roadtrip” community. Maybe it’s doing better than it was fifteen years ago, but to me, it’s still a should-be-dead leftover from the seventies. The chipping paint of the fictional sun-faded city standing defiantly out against the desert sand. And to think: had this land never been stolen, we wouldn’t have something like “Bedrock City.” Hell, Bedrock City was probably here even before the Dine.

     From here, it was a long and straight road south. It dragged by, thanks to the RVs we were stuck behind. Sam was frustrated with the large, slow living-rooms on wheels. I lamented the people inside, having to invest thousands of dollars in this cheap get-away vehicle. Meanwhile, we threw our shit in the trunk and slept in the seats. And made twice the time these tourists did, on a fraction of the budget.

     We stopped at the sign outside of Seligman, birthplace of the Mother Road, then continued on to the turn-off at Kingman. From here? Vegas. But first, we had to prepare ourselves. I bought a pack of menthols, changed into a Hawaiian shirt, and blasted “Viva Las Vegas” as I took the wheel. We lit cigarettes and tore ass up 93. Everyone else on the road was in a rush to get to Vegas too. Even at top speed, we were being passed by trucks and busses. Either that, or they were just trying to get through the Mojave as quickly as possible.

     In June, there is nothing in the Mojave but heat. It was so hot, I could only smoke half of a cigarette before rolling the window up and cranking the air again. From the safety of the air conditioned front seat, the Mojave is a beautiful place. Sun-bleached sand peppered with green and brown bushes make up the flat plane that extends from the base of the nearby hills. We took it all in to “Combination of the Two” and sped north. I meant to take the exit to roll into Nevada over the Hoover Dam, but missed it. At a gas station, we caught our first glimpse of Lake Mead. The brilliant blue water of the lake sat well below a white line that indicated the high water mark. 

     I finished filling the tank just as a group of rally cars pulled in, all of them loud and brightly colored. One had the cartoon duo Beavis and Butthead on the side. I got back in the car and jammed the ignition, kicking on the A/C. I didn’t know what was going to kill me first: the heat, or the shock from seeing the price of a tank of gas: Over eighty-five dollars for regular.

     We skirted around Boulder City, through a vast solar farm, and around a mound, revealing fabulous Las Vegas, shimmering in the distance. Sam and I had planned on hitting Vegas from the beginning, but now we had even more reason to go: Austin.

     Since joining the Navy, we only got to see Austin twice a year, if we were lucky. As luck would have it, he had a detachment in Reno around the same time Sam and I would be rolling through Vegas, which was part of the reason we lingered in Santa Fe for so long.

     This stop would be unlike any of the others. Austin was Sam’s best friend and a close friend of mine. They had lived together since junior year of high school, and any time I hung out with Sam, it was just expectation that Austin would be there too. There was another core member of our central group: Tanner. But he was still in Oklahoma. We’d see him in Pariah Canyon soon enough.

     I followed Sam’s directions through the tame parts of Sin City to a hotel right off of Las Vegas Boulevard. It was a three star chain hotel a few miles south of the Strip. Sam and I grabbed our bags and headed for the lobby. I had closed my Hawaiian shirt and took off my sunglasses, but I still reeked of cigarettes and sweat. The open window had done a number on my hair, and my old army surplus duffel bag with “CONFORMITY IS SURRENDER” written on the side added to my semi-deranged look. The receptionists stared as Sam and I as we stood waiting cluelessly for our friend.

     I didn’t recognize him at first. He had gained some weight since his ankle injury a few months ago, but when he hugged me, it became clear that he had lost none of his strength. Austin introduced us to his girlfriend, Elizabeth, then led us to the elevator.

     “I see y’all are doing the “Fear and Loathing” thing.” He said. Sam and I were both clad in sweat-drenched Hawaiian shirts. “How was the drive?”

     “It wasn’t bad.” I replied. “We stopped to see the Grand Canyon on our way here after screwing around in Santa Fe for a bit. How was y’all’s?”

     “It wasn’t bad. We pretty much just booked it straight here from Washington.”

     “Damn! You drove that straight!?” Sam said.

     “Pretty much. We didn’t have time to stop anywhere. And there was no place to stop, really. And I just wanted to get here and be done with it.”

     After a brief ride to the fourth or fifth floor, Austin took us down the hall to our room. It was twice the size of the Motel 6 we stayed at in Santa Fe, with twice the amenities. Sam and I would have to share a bed, but by the end of the night I was imagining before us, it wouldn’t matter.

     The hotel room was a financial Godsend. Sam looked at the rates for the Flamingo on the way here and they were much higher over the weekend. I didn’t even realize that it was Friday. Good God, our first night in Vegas was a Friday!

     Austin suggested Cane’s, so Sam and I moved the backseat around and made the three block drive to a crowded restaurant filled with teenagers. Austin told us about breaking his ankle and his time in Japan, and I had explained everything I had to do to my car in preparation of the trip. We got our food and every mouth fell silent, busy stuffing down chicken strips and fries.

     “So, do we wanna go to Hoover Dam?” someone finally piped up.

     We filed into my car and went to the hotel room to change. We took Elizabeth’s more modern Subaru to the dam, if for nothing more than the A/C, which could reach the backseat. The drive up there was silent, save for an odd quip here and there about “Fallout: New Vegas,” the legendary game set in a post-apocalyptic Las Vegas. We listened to its soundtrack in silence, starting with Marty Robbins’ “Big Iron,” us boys singing along. As we listened, I had realized we had run into the same issue I had at Eagle Lake: so much to talk about, but so little to say. Where does one even start? I told the story of being denied access to Hoover Dam when we had driven through last year as we rolled up to the security checkpoint. It was too late to laugh when the security guard leaned in the window.

     “Hello, do you have any weapons or explosives in this vehicle?” The agent asked.

     “No.” Austin lied.

     “Alright, you’re clear to move on through.”

     As soon as the window was up, a collective giggle rose through the car.

     “That was it??” Sam and I demanded.

     When we attempted to cross the dam last year, we had come through in the dead of night. The lack of other cars should have been my first indication that the dam was closed and that I’d have to take the bridge over the Colorado River. Security stopped us, informed us that the road was closed, and ask that we turn around. The lady who did so was wearing a pretty damn big iron on her hip that night. But here in the day, the guards had barely looked through the back windows.

     We rolled over to the parking lot on the Arizona side, chugged some water, then trudged across the dam in the highest and driest heat I had experienced yet. The tons of concrete beneath us had trapped the heat and radiated it upwards under my pant cuffs and through my shirt. Without much shade, the walk was miserable. I felt that at any point the soles of my boots would start to melt and stick to the sidewalk. We looked over the edge at the low water level on one side, and the little stream on the other.

     Across the dam, we found that the tours had already ended for the day, but ducked into the gift shop for reprieve from the sun. I looked through the ashtrays, shot glasses, stickers, and knick-knacks, coming out with the ultimate find for a New Vegas fan: a snow globe. I looked through the sunglasses as the rest of the party made their purchases, then we hesitantly headed back out into the horrible heat.

     Despite a lack of variety in the dirty off-white shade of sun-bleached concrete, the Hoover Dam is a beautiful example of both Art Deco architecture and how much care used to be put into the design of everything. Every elevator door, sidewalk railing, and concrete block had thought put into it. When it was constructed in the mid thirties, there was an understanding that people would be walking and driving across this until the end of time. Or, until lake Mead had completely dried up, marking the end of time for Las Vegas. Every surface deserved to be marveled at, but it was just too damned hot.

     Walking back to the car, Austin and Sam jokingly encouraged me to piss over the concrete wall into the spillway, which hadn’t had anything spilled into it since 1983. And only once before then in 1941.

     In the car we guzzled water and set out for Goodsprings, another famous New Vegas location. Austin got turned around on the way there, but after a short drive down I-15 and a turn at Jean, we were in the old west town where you begin the game. We all got our picture in front of the Pioneer Saloon, then headed inside the gift shop adjacent. The saloon is cramped and old, not looking too far off from what you’d see in an old western movie. The high ceiling was capped with bronze colored metal tiles, and the floor beneath us was of old wooden planks, which made a helluva noise under my boot heels and made me feel like I had entered a different place in time.

     It’s 1918. The saloon had opened just five years prior. Four sun-backed silhouettes stand in the doorway as the room falls silent. Who are they? Where did they come from? What are they doing here? And why are they carrying six shooters on their hips? My posse approaches the bar. I tip my hat up and slam a fistfull of dollars on the counter.

     “What’s the best beer in New Mexico?” I demand.

     “I don’t know, this is Nevada.” the bartender replies.

     “Shit, you’re right. We just got out of New Mexico… Then what’s the best beer in Nevada?”

     “That depends. What do you like?”

     “Cheap beer. We drink PBR back home. Y’all got that this far out here?”

     The bartender looked confused and I tried to hide my contempt. After crossing hundreds of miles of barren desert, for the first time I had truly felt like I was in no man’s land.

     “We have Rolling Rock. Five bucks for a pitcher” she said, temptingly.

     “Rolling Rock it is!” I shouted. I paid, brought the beers back, and held a toast.

     “To old friends, new friends, and… Well, I’m not sure what Sam is at this point.” I got a few yuks then we drank up. Now it’s 2281: The post apocalypse. My fellow raiders, scavengers, and mercenaries drink to their heart’s content after a hard day of surviving the Mojave wasteland. This nerd’s fantasy would’ve gone completely uninterrupted if not for the karaoke booth right behind us. I had been to enough karaoke nights to know where this was going: far gone patrons singing old love ballads badly. That’s part of the fun of karaoke, but I was digging the vibe my friends and I were creating. So I ducked into the bathroom, then agreed to meet everyone in the gift shop after they had done the same. There, I had found a sticker to compliment the one I got at Hoover Dam. Austin, Elizabeth, and I waited for a cashier, but they never came. The only other person to enter the room was Sam.

     “I got heckled when I came out of the bathroom.” he said.

     “What? Why??” Austin and I demanded.

     “Because we left without doing any karaoke.”

     Sonuvabitch, this karaoke night wasn’t a cheap trick to drum up money. It was a local tradition! We had walked right into that bar, drank their beer, and LEFT. Without so much as a wave or a thank you. I wouldn’t accept this.

     I marched right back into the bar and approached the karaoke booth. I heard “you’re back!” from somewhere in the bar.

     “My friends and I would like to request a song, please.” I said politely.

     “Alrighty, what song is it?”

     “Big Iron, by Marty Robbins.” There were plenty of songs I could subject this bar to, but “Big Iron” was the only one I was certain Sam and Austin knew as well because we’d sang it together so many times before.

     “Okay, can I get a name?” the DJ asked.

     “Tate.”

     “Okay Teddy, I’ve got one song before you, then you’ll be next.” The man smiled at me as I turned towards the bar. It wasn’t worth it to correct him. I held the sticker up to the bartender and she said I could have it for free. I ordered a shot of Screwball and tipped her well. With the shot settling in, my confidence was up. I had gotten over my fear of singing in front of people a few months before in Oklahoma, thanks to Savannah. And I wasn’t afraid of singing badly, because anything would be better than what was currently on stage. Sam and I tried to get Austin to come up with us, but he wouldn’t do it. We could only beg for so long before-

     “Teddy! You’re up!”

     I grabbed a mic and handed it to Sam, then took the other one and BLANK. I vaguely recall addressing the crowd of middle aged women from the “stage” which was little more than a corner at the back of the bar. If I did, I think I would’ve said something along the lines of “Howdy y’all. My name’s Tate and this here’s my friend Sam. We’re from Oklahoma and we drove all the way out to see our best friend Austin and his girlfriend, who’re in the Navy, so we could spend a night in Vegas together. Anyway, we’re gonna sing Big Iron for y’all” or something like that.

     As soon as the song began to play, Austin semi-reluctantly joined us. He sang into Sam’s mic, creating a beautiful duet between the two. I was on my own, so I put on the best show that I could by drawing an imaginary pistol from my cocked hip and pointing it upwards. This drew some hollers from the women in the sparsely populated crowd. Halfway through the song, I noticed my mic wasn’t working, but I kept singing anyway. It was all about the performance at this point. The closing notes of the song faded as I held “hiiiiiiiiiiip” for as long as I could. The crowd clapped and cheered as we strutted out. At the car, I could see that Austin was hiding a smile. A look that said “that was silly,” but also “that was fun.”

     I melted into the all-too-familiar bliss coma that comes with familial comfortability and just a little too much to drink, then sank into my seat. We drove around Goodsprings listening to the New Vegas soundtrack before turning towards Jean once again. We pulled into a gas station that must’ve been the Mojave equivalent of a Buc-ee’s. It was a superstore with much more than snacks and drinks; it had home decor, clothes, toys, and every kind of souvenir shop knick-knack you could think of. Bright lights bordered the ceiling, music played from arcade games, and everywhere you looked was some kind of visual draw. A car from the “James Bond” movies, a monster truck, an airplane suspended from the ceiling. All of it screaming “look over here! Come over here! I want to sell you something!”

     I spent no more time inside than I had to. This awful bazaar was the last stop before Vegas for many travelers from the west coast. And for many others, it was the last stop before heading back. I returned to the car to resume my bliss coma when Elizabeth asked me “so what do you do?”

     “I have an associate’s in digital cinematography,” I replied. “I’m in the process of editing a short film now, and I’m a journalist, of sorts.” Which was the usual canned answer. But I couldn’t help but ask: What do I do? And what am I doing HERE?

     I’m on a road trip. I’m here for the experience of experiencing something. I’d been to Vegas a few times as a kid, but now I’m an adult. I can smoke, drink, gamble, and wind up in jail, if I’m not careful. I have no compulsion to gamble, but I must be able to say that I did. The goal here is just that: seeing what Las Vegas has to offer. No expectations, no reservations, just seeing what she shows me.

     And show me she would. On the way back to the hotel, I told Elizabeth all the best stories of me, Sam, and Austin’s young adulthood. Calamitous camping trips, hellish hikes, and things that were just plain stupid. But we were boys, and we lived for that sort of thing. I suppose that part of us never died, still living on in a confused stupor. I talked all the way to the hotel and up to the room until I went downstairs for a cigarette and to wait on the Uber.

     Just as I had won my battle against the wind, the driver pulled up. I snubbed my cig against the bottom of my boot and tucked it back into the pack. The driver requested I throw the cigarette away entirely in an effort to keep the smell out of his car. I reluctantly complied, tossing the full cigarette onto the ground. The rest of the party piled in and we were headed for the Flamingo. I put on a usually-repressed Okie drawl and asked him what it was like to live in Las Vegas. I must be the worst journalist out there, because I remember none of what he told me, aside from the worst part being the traffic, local traffic, in specific, and the best part: there’s always something going on.

     He dropped us off at the rear entrance. We were met by a cacophony of voices and cars. I lit another cigarette, accidentally dropping it out of my holder. I felt imaginary eyes on me as I contemplated picking it up and finishing it, so I ground it out with my boot and tried again. Fuck! That’s two cigarettes I’m down! The rest of the pack wouldn’t last through the night. Austin and Elizabeth ventured inside as Sam and I dragged our cigarettes down. After a brief eternity, Austin emerged and grabbed us.

     “Yo, they’ll let y’all smoke in here.”

     I cautiously ventured forth, death stick in hand, and let the psychedelic pattern of the pink, gold, and black carpet overwhelm my eyes. I had made it this far and hadn’t been kicked out. We’re in! We went up a set of stairs towards the main gambling hall, passing people, people, people, so many damned people. It was a miracle we found enough stools at the bar. I took a seat and ordered our first round. My amaretto sour went down smooth. We talked a bit more and I tried to observe.

     People sat at slot machines near our bar. They were built in groups of three. We didn’t have to walk anywhere to gamble, there were games built into the bartop. The local news was on the TV. The forecast called for more sun and more heat. No shit. There were election ads for county sheriff. There’s law and order in this town? Nonsense. We finished our drinks and felt our appetites. Fortunately, Austin had been to Vegas multiple times before we had, so he knew all the spots. He led us outside and across an elevated walkway to an outdoor shopping mall. It’s still hot. It’s ten o’clock. And it’s still fucking hot. Was the liquor suppressing that fact? Or amplifying it?

     Austin and Elizabeth got in line for hot dogs, while Sam and I posted up at a table outside. I was too drunk to be hungry. All kinds of people passed by, loud and drunk. We weren’t much better, but at least we were quiet.

     Just as I was looking at a vending machine full of insoles, Austin came back with a tall cup of some kind of frozen liquor. I looked at it and groaned. The night had just begun, but I didn’t know how much more I could take. I sucked down a bit anyway and went to a store down the way. I was looking for sunglasses in a tiny store full of tee shirts and souvenirs. Sam handed me a huge gaudy pair of shades.

     “I think you’d look good in these.”

     I put them on and we laughed.

     “I don’t know if I can pull these off.”

     The girl behind the counter was wearing braces: too young for the strip. My filter was long gone and I was curious.

     “How old are you?”

     “Eighteen.” She answered plainly. I was almost tempted to point out that it was past her bedtime, but this might be the best work a kid can get in a town like Las Vegas.

     We found Austin and Elizabeth, then continued our stroll southwards, crossing Bally’s Drive. I sipped the alcoholic concoction carefully. Pace yourself. The views are enough. Women walked by dressed for the triple digit heat. Some worth looking at. Most worth looking away.

     A man stopped us in the street with what looked like playing cards. Before I could hear the man’s spiel, I took them and examined my two. On the card was a completely naked woman with poorly censored nipples. It was an advertisement for an outcall stripper service. This town has everything! I couldn’t afford it, nor did I need this kind of entertainment at the moment, so Sam and I just ogled our cards shamelessly. We compared what we got and then picked up more discards littering the sidewalk. They were everywhere! I felt a little disgusted with myself, trading cards with Sam like these women were nothing more than a pricetag, a name, and a phone number. He turned to me and declared “I’m a feminist” as he handed me Brandi and I gave him the well-endowed Alexa.

     Poor Alexa was cast onto the ground, worth only sixty-nine dollars. Jade was apparently worth less at fifty dollars, tossed aside to be swept away into the Mojave by the desert wind. Was it wrong to treat these women like baseball cards? On our parts, yes.

     However, these women had some sort of a notoriety we could never have in Las Vegas. Was my naked body printed on a card, being seen by the thousands of tourists that flow through the streets at any given hour? Was I being called to entertain, on nothing more than an image and a name? Was I worth sixty nine dollars? The answer is a resounding “no.” Horny young women (or men) weren’t assessing my value, putting me above or below other entertainers, regardless of the created “worth” printed in the top left corner: these were dignified women who were skilled at their craft. And before you judge what polite society may deem a “common whore,” ask if you could do the same thing. Just like the drugs so condemned in this country, there wouldn’t be sellers if it weren’t for buyers. Supply and demand. And these women in demand were coming to the rescue in twenty minutes or less. Not everyone can pull off a striptease. Not everyone can perform a lapdance. Not everyone can keep their bodies in a shape to be desirable to the male gaze. Not everyone can be pretty.

     But these women can. And they use it to their advantage. How many hundreds do they make per night? How much strain is it to go from one bachelor, or bachelorette party to the next, putting on act after act after act? Treating each client as if they were special.

     Those who condemn these girls are jealous. Jealous they can’t look like that. Jealous they can’t make money that quick. Jealous they can’t be as sexually liberated as these women are. These women are being who they want to be and who many other women aspire to be. They’re a representation of the lust of the American Spirit, the Desire. That’s Vegas.

     They came here to play and they came here to win. Isn’t that the American Dream?

     That’s all this town is: an exaggeration of the wants of America. The American Dream. Anyone can win, but it’s a gamble either way. Thompson had already addressed this in “Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas” in 1973. He came in search of the same thing and never found it, summing his search up as “a lame fuckaround. A waste of time.” But I’d argue that Thompson was being disingenuous. The answer was right in front of him, bathed in artificial light and coated in gold plating.

     The American Dream, as desired, not as promised, is a lavish lifestyle. With drinks by the pool, gorgeous women, top quality food, and a luxurious room to fall asleep in at the end of the day. It’s fast cars, strippers, booze, classy parties, and obscene wealth. The fat midwesterners and tourists who made the journey to the Gem of the Mojave are here to strike it rich. To win big. Just one more pull of the slot machine and the chips will come pouring out, financing a new car. One more throw of the dice buys a new house. One good game makes you filthy, disgustingly rich.

     But, this is not often, if ever, the case. The House always wins. And, to quote Fallout: New Vegas, “the game was rigged from the start.” Nobody leaves Las Vegas richer. All of the bells, whistles, and flashing lights of the casino are tools of deception. If they can win, so can I. It’s a big lie. A charade. A scam. Vegas promises big winners, but none of the gamblers come out on top. The House always wins.

     I didn’t feel this way while stumbling down the strip, thumbing through my cards. All I felt was a confused ecstasy. I was here, taking it all in. Then we were at our destination: Paris.

     We stumbled inside and looked around. Yep, it’s a cheap mock-up of Paris. A simulation. A facade. I wasn’t buying it, and neither was anyone else in the party. Elderly faces sat in front of slot machines as I passed by, dragging another cigarette. Las Vegas is the town most conducive to chain-smoking. You can smoke everywhere. The House wants you to have a good time! You don’t need to step out to smoke! There’s an ashtray by your side at all times, so long as you’re gambling. If you’re just walking around, gawking, like I was, ashtrays are hard to find.

     We took a few pictures by the fountain. The first snapshot is of Sam, Elizabeth, and a surprised Austin seen from my own perspective. The next two pictures are of the same thing, though Austin caught on and is raising an enthusiastic middle finger in front of a defiant and happy face.

     There’s me and Sam. He’s leaning against the fountain railing and blowing out a puff of smoke. There’s me in my white jeans, that I had ironed and saved for this chapter of the trip, my red Hawaiian shirt, and a cigarette hanging from my lips, mouth cocked in a drunken smile.

     Now, we were headed for New York New York. On the way down, we were stopped by two “showgirls.” Austin had warned us about this scam at the hotel. You take a few pictures, and then they charge you. Nothing comes free in this town.

     “Do these pictures cost anything?” I asked against the chaotic sidewalk.

     “Nope! It’s completely free!” the twenty-year-old said.

     I looked at Sam and said “why not?” We stood in between the girls for two pictures. In the first, they held their arms up, welcoming these two suckers to Fabulous Las Vegas. There we are, two smiling drunks sandwiched between two girls not much younger than ourselves, clad in knee-high white boots, a strappy, sequined leotard, and dramatically tall feathered headpieces. The one on the left had braces. The one on the right had a smile that was never meant for pictures. The kind of smile you only see in the freshman section of a high school yearbook.

     In the second, they have their hands on their hips and Sam and I are sporting the same expression Austin was at Paris. Skeptical, yet cocky. Before he had even looked at his second picture to see if it turned out alright-

     “So, we work for tips. Usually we get about forty dollars each.”

Forty fucking dollars?? EACH?? These girls were worth five at best! Damn it! Austin had tried to warn us, but we just wouldn’t listen. I could even see the “I-told-you-so” in his smile. I handed the girls a ten each and told them it would be okay. They insisted it wasn’t and acted upset. They’re pretty, sort of. They should have no trouble making a few hundred in the next hour or so.

     We pressed on to New York New York, then sat at a table outside. Austin’s ankle was starting to hurt. We had done a lot of walking. A couple sat at a table nearby. Both people were drunk. The girl had her head on the table, begging to leave. The man insisted they go somewhere. I gave Sam a look, indicating that we should hang around and see how this pans out. We would intervene, if necessary, and make sure the girl got in a taxi safe. They kept at it, back and forth, then Austin said it was just a domestic issue and that we should move on. I forced us to hang out for just a minute more until they left and all was fine. She was cute, maybe she should’ve come with us. Take her out to the coast, why not? Romance was fresh in my mind from Santa Fe, but the lugubrious desire for someone else’s lips against my own enveloped and then rolled past my face like warm smoke. The couple moved on, and so did we.

     Inside New York New York, we found a bar at the back with just enough seats for our party. Austin bought us a round and I stared at the game screen in the counter. The last person here had spent ninety five dollars on this game. Another Modelo. They don’t even know what PBR is out here. The bartender likes fireball. That’s how you know she’s crazy. She turns us on to the local watering hole, but I think all of us are too drunk to even try to make it there. On the TV, Oklahoma beats Texas. At… baseball. I think. Maybe softball. Soccer? It doesn’t matter. We beat Texas. I excuse myself to the restroom. Alone in the stall, I hear a voice, loudly proclaiming to no one in particular: “I love Vegas! What a time to be alive!” I return to the table and as soon as I sit down and light my cigarette, a drunk man gets mouthy with Sam. Austin hops up out of his seat. Sam starts to slide out of his. Oh, shit. Are we doing this? I snub my cigarette and stand as well, completely clueless as to what to expect next, completely unprepared for a rumble. The bartender calls security and firmly asks the man to leave. She grabs an older guard from nearby as the man finally fucks off. The older guard acts like he can’t do anything. Austin pays his tab and we leave before he kills anyone. He’s shaking. He’s PISSED.

     We catch an Uber to Circus Circus. It’s the most pathetic casino yet, waaaaay down at the end of the strip. Out of the way. Our goal is the upstairs with the rotating bar. It’s closed. Why?? We press on to the bathrooms. There’s a young lady, no older than twenty, sitting with her luggage on the stairs, holding her head.

     “Miss, are you alright?” I ask.

     She snaps her head up and enthusiastically lies “Yep!’ then returns to hanging her head. I didn’t buy it. I duck into the bathroom. There’s a needle disposal. I thought Circus Circus was supposed to be a family hotel and casino. We wander to a mock-up of the “Welcome to Fabulous Las Vegas” sign and have another tourist get pictures of all of us. There we are, all together. We had made it.

     Now we’re at the bar. Another Modelo. Austin starts opening up. He misses us. It’s killing him. We talk. We hold each other by the shoulders. Promise to always be friends. Brothers. Elizabeth is welcome so long as Austin likes her. She’s part of the gang. It devolves to stripper stories. It’s late. REAL late. Sam and I take a picture in front of the Circus Circus sign and intercept our Uber back to the hotel. The drinks have us comatose. I slept in my clothes.

OVERDOSE

     LAS VEGAS, NEVADA

     JUNE 11TH, 2022

     The hangover came up slow. I started the day with a shower, then joined Sam downstairs to discuss our next move. He wanted to do another night in Vegas: there was more to do, more to see, according to him. But I was apprehensive. I wanted to see my aunt and uncle, for sure, but after that, how much more could I take? I reluctantly agreed, given that you don’t find yourself in Sin City often, and I wanted Sam to get the full experience while he was here.

     Austin and Elizabeth met us downstairs to say goodbye. We promised to see eachother again soon in Washington, then headed out.

     The keypad at the gate of my aunt and uncle’s neighborhood gave us a bit of trouble, but we managed to make our way in. They welcomed us into their home and my aunt, ever the hostess, gave us the grand tour and invited us to stay if we needed another night in town. A very generous offer, but after experiencing me and Sam after a night on the strip, they’d never offer a room to any family or friends again. Though, we didn’t want another full night. We’d burned ourselves out the night before. The only thing we desired now was some kind of buttery, fat-filled cure to our collective hangover. They loaded us into their Range Rover, which was parked next to their Corvette, and drove us through Vegas traffic to the Bellagio. We found semi-decent parking and got in line for Seville. They encouraged us to wander around and take pictures of the carefully tended garden, with its giant animals made of different flora. We did a short loop, then rejoined them in the slow-moving line.

     This was when my hangover went from benign to terminal. I couldn’t tell if I was fried from last night’s excursion, or just sun-fucked. But I was gooooone. My relatives were cool people. Were cool people. They were hippies in the sixties, but got their shit together and now they play golf and drive Corvettes. Sellouts? Or victims? I wondered if the same thing would happen to me. I’m twenty-four now, sleeping in my car and wandering the West trying to find a good place to get drunk. Philosopher, poet, romantic, degenerate. Could it happen to me? Would I get a decent job that would make me sacrifice this live-by-whim lifestyle I so treasure? Would I buy a sports car every few years? Would I worry about the stock market?

     I could’ve asked my uncle how it happened. How one would fall from Haight-Ashbury to highrise. But I was too far gone. I could only ask topical questions, reporter style.

     Tell me about Las Vegas. How did you end up here? Where did the town come from? Where is it going? What’s going to happen when Lake Mead dries up?

     To this question, my uncle just shrugged. Lake Mead is getting low. Very low. Sam explained it at some point: it’s a state dispute. Not enough water is flowing down the Colorado River. Too many states lay claim. And when the water runs out? The lights go down. No more Las Vegas. Sin City dries up. That would explain all the solar farms between here and Boulder City. But are they enough to keep the lights on? Or would the city go dark?

     A lady in front of us collapses. Her man catches her and the restaurant staff rush to her aid. A well dressed man who I can only assume is the manager approaches her and offers her a seat. My uncle sits too. My aunt explains: “He can’t do everything he used to when he was your age. And it kills him.”

     There’s nothing I fear more than getting old. I’m pretty spry now. I can’t run a marathon. Nor can I excel in any physical sport. But I can walk, stand, and lift heavy objects without difficulty. Beyond whatever damage cigarettes and alcohol have done to me, I’m in pretty good shape. But the day I can’t do any of those things?  I have no desire to see what happens after that. You might as well take me around back and shoot me.

     I realize that everyone gets old. Everyone ages and their bodies do too. But I cower at the thought of spending my whole life as an able bodied person, then having that taken away. Just because you had been here for too long. It’s why I don’t save for retirement. Enjoy the Now! That’s what this whole trip is about. Do it now while you’re young and able. Because when you’re not, it’ll be a lot more painful. Imagine a seventy-year-old scaling Black Mesa. An eighty-year-old sleeping out on the cold concrete. A ninety-year-old baking in the sun. They’d die. Doing what I’m doing now would kill them. So they avoid it. They stay inside, watch TV, and count the minutes until death takes them and all that’s left is a legacy. A legacy of what? I’ve never done anything spectacular. Why should I be remembered? Any impact that I make today will be wiped out by nuclear war, or climate change, or plain neglect. So what am I living for?

     I’m living for this. Eating the best damned egg sandwich I’ve ever had in a fancy restaurant in some Godforsaken town in the Mojave. The painted vaulted ceiling looms above as we sit at a polished table surrounded by striped cotton and silk seats. The tile sits below my dusty boots and half-naked women dive into the pool beyond the plate glass window. The atmosphere was stunning, but the real ecstasy was caressing my tastebuds.

     Sam’s french toast was good too. As thick as a cake. After seeing the world record holding chocolate fountain, we left the restaurant and my relatives drove us around showing us the sights of what may be new in Vegas in the next few years. Back at my car, I revved the engine for them and took off. I had avoided cigarettes all morning so I wouldn’t smell like smoke in front of my relatives, but as soon as I had turned the corner, I lit up an American Spirit and realized that my efforts had been fruitless.

     The whole car smelled like wet ashtray.

     To clarify, I’m not a regular smoker. I just smoke when I’m having a good time. And I expected this whole trip to be one long nonstop party. So I bought four packs before I left Norman. They didn’t even make it to Nevada.

     Now what? We had an entire day to kill before the sun set and the city came out. I drove us up and down Las Vegas Boulevard, listening to a Rat Pack recording from 1963. To the left and right were glamorous hotels that reached the sky. Pure luxury beyond anything I could ever afford. I couldn’t see any of it, because I was focusing on the taillights of the person in front of me.

     Vegas is the most hostile traffic I had encountered yet. After a few miles, I had figured out the trick: just drive as aggressively as everyone else. That’s the only way you’ll make it. Otherwise, you’ll get run over.

     We cruised by Fremont, then by the Old Mormon Fort, then to the “hip” part of Vegas, where the locals drank. Back on the Boulevard, I started to get frustrated. It was the traffic, and the heat, and the hangover, and the- WHAT THE FUCK IS THIS INTERSECTION? WHERE THE FUCK IS THE TURN LANE? I was pissy to say the least. Las Vegas will chew you up and shit your out, no matter how much you prepare yourself for it. This town thrives on new blood, but my blood was getting thin and weak. I pulled us into the nearest parking lot and booked my ticket to Meow Wolf. I had to step out of the car to be alone for a minute, to center myself. I looked up towards the dry blue sky and breathed in the heat. It rushed through my nostrils and expended into my lungs. Damn this town, and damn the heat that surrounds it. Why Vegas of all places? It’s a damned death trap. Nothing here but heat and vanishing money. I looked back towards Sam as he booked his tickets.

     “Just one more night.” I told myself. “One more night and we’re moving on.” Suck it up, get in the car, DRIVE.

     We were on the move again. We pulled into a parking lot and saw the trademark blue and white Oklahoma license plate on an old Ford Taurus. Sam hopped out, pointed at the plate and said “It’s good to see a familiar face” to the driver and passengers, milling outside the car.

     “We’re from Norman.” I added. These were obviously working class people. Midwestern slobs who were probably staying in a $55/night motel over in the Las Vegas sticks. Their car was filled to the brim too. I looked at my own and realized that we had more in common than just our state. We were both on a grand roadtrip. Vegas was their peak. Everything that the past year or so had been leading up to. They were here, we were here. Our separate motivations were unknown to each other, but somehow, two pairs of Okies ended up in the same parking lot:

     The parking lot of our next destination: “WORLD’S LARGEST GIFT SHOP.” I could believe it. Crap lined every shelf. From floor to ceiling, in two rooms. In the third, there was “authentic” leather jackets and vests, tee-shirts depicting Native Americans in headdresses looking up at eagles and wolves, and expensive busts of various animals. A small sign taped to the wall read: “YOU BREAK IT, YOU BUY IT.”

     Maybe I should buy one just to break it. Nothing in the store was of any interest to me, but I promised a coworker that I’d bring them back a souvenir. And what better place to do it than here? I walked out with an energy drink and a “pimp license.” Sam commented on the energy drink, as I’d NEVER put caffeine into my body. Caffeine is the work of the devil. With a tasty liquid you can electrify your nerves and energize your mind. A panic attack in a can. Some people ride the high. They NEED a cup of coffee or a Monster to fully wake up. But I never understood it. Alcohol numbs the mind. Nicotine tugs it along. That’s all I needed. But in the blistering heat of a Vegas afternoon, I was desperate for ANYTHING that would keep me going.

     Downing half of the sweet-tasting pick-me-up, I pulled into the garage under the “Linq” hotel/casino. The space was tight, and as far away from the door as you could get, but it meant we’d have a place to kill the next two hours before our reservation at Meow Wolf.

     No tables, shit! We ordered from the bar and I bought another pack of menthols from a cigarette girl. As soon as a couple left, Sam and I claimed their spot and sprawled out, gawking at the pathetic midwesterners surrounding us. Finally, a waitress approached.

     “Aw, you guys took my table! How am I supposed to make money if I can’t wait this table?”

     “Sorry… There were no spots available at the bar… and we didn’t see this table until just now. I can still tip you.”

     She looked barely placated and said “okay,” and left us alone. I approached her a few minutes later with seven dollars to shut her up.

     “Hey, I didn’t know we’d be taking your table. Otherwise, I wouldn’t’ve ordered from the bar.”

     She took the money and smiled. I had assumed that this would settle any hostilities she had towards us, but no. She never returned. And when she disappeared ten or twenty minutes later, no waitress came to refill our drinks. We had been blacklisted. The waitress who had replaced her was really pretty too. But she never came by. And no matter how I tried to get her attention, she completely ignored us.

     I wanted to get a picture of Sam and I, living the dream in Las Vegas. Two bored twenty-somethings with a few hundred dollars each, living out the Hunter S. Thompson fantasy.

     There was a girl at the bar who had a sandal slip off of her foot. It sat on the floor for a good five minutes. Maybe if I returned her shoe to her I could ask her to take the picture I wanted. I stood up, pointed out the missing shoe, and upon seeing her state, immediately returned to my seat. She was GONE. I asked the cigarette girl from earlier to do the job instead. And the picture we got was ICONIC.

     There’s me and Sam, sitting with our drinks at a table in a Las Vegas casino. My boots still shiny and fresh, my purple-tinted sunglasses, my hawaiian shirt. Sam smiling like he’d finally found the bliss that he’d been looking for. But it was just a moment, captured in time. Just a moment.

     It was finally time to head over. Sam and I exited the bar and made for Meow Wolf. It was a bit of a challenge to get to, but we made it with time to spare. We sat in the parking lot smoking and sipping the energy drink. The A/C doing nothing against the afternoon desert heat. At least the sun was starting to go down.

     We walked across the parking lot to the line that was forming at the front door. I reached for my phone and -fuck! I had left it in the car. This meant trudging all the way back through the desert heat to the car, then trudging back to the line, where I would have inevitably lost my spot. Meaning I’d have to wait in the heat longer.

     Fuck that. I approached the guard at the side door close to where we had parked and asked if I could come in that way. He let me in and I texted Sam. The whole building was dark. The few lights inside illuminated an arcade, a few shopping centers, and a bar. Flashing lights and noise galore: typical Vegas. I got in line for Meow Wolf and checked in. I got out of line to find Sam, then had him check in so we could enter. Shortly thereafter, we were in.

     At first glance, it was an innocuous grocery store, maintaining the same innocence of the Santa Fe Meow Wolf. But upon closer inspection, the products on the shelf ceased to make sense. Cubed peas. Peanut-free salted peanuts. Dehydrated water. Gag gifts. Shit your weird aunt would get you because you don’t know each other. Sam and I looked around the grocery store until I found a gap in the shelves. I motioned Sam over, and then we were in the back room. The corporate office/factory/tribal reservation where the mystery of the store could be unveiled, had you chosen to partake in the game.

     But I didn’t want to think. I wanted to absorb. I cut Sam loose and started wandering. I took in all the sights and all the people. So many damned people. Bachelorette parties, teenagers, couples on double dates. And here I was alone.

     I missed Savannah. I imagined us both exploring the exhibit, but whenever I reached for her hand, there was nothing there. I had a good time regardless looking at all the art and pushing the buttons and climbing through little doors and tight caves. But there was something missing: her.

     I wasn’t too broken up when we had left Santa Fe: We’d had a good time together. But now I was without, and the loneliness was starting to catch up with me.

     After circling the exhibit, I found Sam. We showed each other what the other had missed, then went back into the store. The whole thing was a critique on consumerism, but here I was, falling right into the trap. I had to leave with something. There was an empty cereal box: “Oh, Those:” a cereal made up of things you’d find in a junk drawer. The marshmallow bits (loosely) resembled screws, coins, staplers, keys, batteries, and sauce packets. Things I can distinctly remember finding in the junk drawer of my own home.

     The mascot on the box was a stupid drawer filled with cereal, looking up lovingly at the milk being poured into it’s open head cavity. The sharp teeth and thoughtless eyes reminded me of my cat, Pippin, who was now residing with Lydia in Oregon. The empty box was ten dollars. But I had to have it.

     We both stuffed our souvenirs into the trunk before taking off through more hostile traffic to Las Vegas Boulevard. We parked behind the Flamingo and set out on foot to another night of confused Hell in Sin City.

     Our first stop was the Bellagio. We went straight through to catch a reverse angle of the fountain show. The show was set to pop music, Bruno Mars, I think. So I took little interest in it and suggested we move on to Caesar’s Palace. I ordered an amaretto sour at the bar, sucking it down while two hicks talked about their guns. They carried the energy of regulars. Or, at the very least, people who had been to Vegas multiple times and made this particular bar a favored stop on their route.

     Back into the sweltering night, we were deadset on catching the volcano show. A man pulling a wagon full of beer sold two Modelos to Sam. He handed me one and I had no choice but to drink it.

     All the front row spots at the railing had been taken up. So we had no choice but to move across the street, where we had barely found space to squeeze in. The volcano would tease us by glowing red and rumbling, but nothing would happen. I observed a lady in overalls jaywalking the six or eight lanes of Las Vegas Boulevard traffic, boldly strolling over to our side of the street. Even from a distance, I could she wasn’t particularly cute. But she was incredibly ballsy.

     Again, the volcano glowed red and did nothing. I cheered anyway. I look over to my right, and who else would it be? The lady in overalls.

     “What’s everyone waiting on?” she asked.

     “The volcano show. That mound right there is supposed to spew lava and fire any minute now.” I answered.

     Her name was Chrissy. She was from Canada. She’d come to Vegas often. But she wouldn’t hang around. She left us just as the volcano started to erupt in a grand display of flames and red-light-illuminated water. Even from across the street, you could feel the heat off the flames. After sixty somewhat impressive seconds of fire and flame, the show was over. That was it?

     Sam and I took the moving sidewalks into the Venetian. The booze was settling in fast. When was the last time I ate? Sam and I ordered a water each and found our way to the canal. The gondola rides were $39 each and you couldn’t smoke, drink, or eat on the +20 minute tour.

     No thanks, we have a town to see! Back on the sidewalk, we watched street performers rob unsuspecting tourists. Sam and I had gotten wise to the game, but those poor hicks didn’t know what was about to hit them.

     Women in “sexy” cop outfits that they only sold in Halloween stores spanked bald middle-aged men, while buff wannabe-cowboys lifted bachelorettes for pictures. People walked by in every direction, dazzled by the lights and the SPECTACLE.

     Sam and I crossed the street to get away from it and called an Uber. The night was growing long and there was one stop left to hit: Fremont. My aunt and uncle had hyped it up at brunch. Fremont is crazy. Fremont is wild. Fremont is X-rated. Naturally, we had to go.

     In front of Caesar’s Palace, we waited among other drunk and confused Vegas victims. Two different men tried to sell us coke. Another bummed a cigarette and shared the unsolicited sob story of how his wallet and phone got stolen.

     Finally, Peng arrived. He drove like he owned the road and pissed off quite a few cars on the highway. I was too drunk to care. Had I been sober, I would’ve been white-knuckling the “oh shit” handle and pressing my imaginary brake to the floor. But out-of-my-mind wasted, it was kinda fun.

     Peng pulled the car into the middle of the intersection and let us out like we were movie stars arriving at the Chinese Theater in a limousine. And our premiere? Fremont. A wide sidewalk PACKED with people. The marquees on the buildings to my left and right didn’t make sense. The words were there, but there was nothing but letters. People. Elbow to elbow. I remember the “Four Queens,” one of the old casinos. The LED screens above, blocking out the night sky. The lights. The cacophony of the crowd. A concert to our left. An ill feeling. No time to stop. The street lit up like it was broad daylight. An ill feeling? Maybe the booze. The water wasn’t enough. People. People everywhere. People swiping your wallet. People swiping your phone. People swiping your cigarettes. Keep walking. Go. Cross this street, FAST. People. The Gold Nugget. Hey! The big cowboy from “Fear and Loathing!” Or Victor from Fallout: New Vegas? Keep walking. Don’t stop. Look, but for your life’s sake, DON’T STOP. Good God, so many fucking people. No choice but to bump into them. That’s enough. That’s so much MORE than enough. Get me out of here. Please. Excuse me. Thanks. Fuck. Please, get me the hell out of here.

     Finally. Reprieve. We’re across the street. Thank God. We’re out of there. Breathe. Suck in, hold, exhale. SLOW. The awful noise still echoes, so I keep walking. Sidewalk below me. A wall to my right. Street to my left. Ceiling above me, filled with all kinds of sparkling light. It’s safe, for Vegas.

     No it’s not. Keep your guard up. Still sick. Getting worse. People walk slowly by. They want to rob us. They want to KILL us! I’m dehydrated. Hungry. Liquor-lashed. Smoke-smashed. And the fucking heat! It’s midnight for God’s sake!

     I call an Uber. I silently ignore my paranoia. Just eat something and you’ll be straight. Breathe slow, you’ll be okay. Salvation pulled up in a white Toyota. The driver was nice. An older lady. She recommended the Italian place we parked across the street from. A stunted conversation later, and there we were. FUCK. The restaurant was closed. Whatever. I never really wanted to eat anyway. I just wanted to get the hell out of here. Back in the car. True safety. The cool A/C sobered me. I waited patiently to pay for parking. It was too much, but what could I do? Back on the street. How do we get OUT??

     I bumbled away. Wrong turn after wrong turn until I found a gas station. I filled up and went inside. FUUUUUUUCK! No bathroom. I hightailed it to the big gas station outside of Goodsprings and barely made it to one of the hundreds of urinals. Yes. Thank God. Much better. I pushed my hand against the wall and looked into the urinal. The entire Vegas experience circling the drain. Goodbye Las Vegas. Until next time.

     Now what? L.A. was a four hour burn West. My relatives had offered to let us stay with them, but the best time to cross the Mojave is at night, so I declined. It was one in the morning. We could be there by five, well before sunup. I pulled us back onto the interstate and took off. Through Primm, over the Cali border. We were practically there. A fruit check station, the same kind found at every entrance into California, then open highway.

     Sam fell asleep. I was getting close. My eyes started to cross. The lines on the highway started to blur. Sleep pleaded to take over. NO! I saw a sign for a rest stop and resolved to push it the ten or so miles. Besides, we can’t stop here; this is BAT COUNTRY. After a short delirious drive through darkness and desert, I pulled into the first space I saw and jacked the car into park. Sam jolted awake.

     “I can’t go on. I try to push it any further and I’ll get us killed.”

     Sam nodded and fell back asleep. I clobbered into the backseat and passed out.

THE EDGE

     VALLEY WELLS REST AREA, CALIFORNIA

     JUNE 12TH, 2022

     I jolted awake. Sam did so simultaneously.

     “Shit!”

     The sun was peeking over the horizon and we still had three hours to go. If we waited any longer, we’d risk overheating, dehydrating, starving, DYING. Sam volunteered to drive and I gladly let him. I put on my “To Los Angeles” playlist, specially made for another road trip that never came to be, and passed out.

     Two hours later, I awoke in the hills outside of San Bernardino. My hunger came back, but this time it couldn’t be ignored. I nourished myself with a packet of waffle-flavored Pop-Tarts and some Doritos, which were part of the care package my mother had built for us before we left.

     I sat in the backseat, being chauffeured by Sam, taking in the vast nothing. Big box stores and strip malls. Subdivisions as far as the eye could see. This space was uniquely liminal. Sure, there were obvious signs of human life, but I couldn’t shake the feeling that this was some kind of stage.

     Beyond the highway was a neighborhood full of four bedroom houses where Mom, and Pop, and Buddy, and Sis ran around a table in the morning, frantically trying to get ready for school and work. Each character looks into the camera one at a time during the opening credits while their name comes up in big letters at the bottom of the screen. They all file out of the house to the bus or to the carpool while Mom tries to wave but nobody sees her, so she just shakes her head. It’s like this every morning, isn’t it, Mom?

     We pass the coffee chain where the teenage Sis works, and there’s the big box store Buddy got accused of stealing from in season two. Look there! It’s the vague office building Pop works at! No. I should save the tour bus experience for Hollywood Boulevard.

     I’d imagine every house is like this. The same family with the same routine and the same faces. The same scripted struggles with the same resolutions that makes the live studio audience go “aww” whenever the light ordering them to do so comes on. Hell no.

     Alternative theory: these houses are all empty. They’re fully furnished with couches and TV’s, but the only occupants are mannequins. Placed in the hallways and bedrooms and living rooms and bathrooms. And there’s a tower somewhere, a few miles away up in the hills we just drove through, holding an atomic bomb, not unlike the one at the museum in Albuquerque. Just waiting to drop and blow this facade of the American Dream to smithereens: vaporizing Mom and Pop and Buddy and Sis in a great flash of light, then blowing the notion of them out across the desert.

     Is this the American Dream? To conform? To live in the same houses and work in the same businesses just waiting for the day you get blown away into nothing? Your life and legacy being no more than data points on a sheet? Not for me, no thank you! Conformity is surrender: It says so on my bag.

     Sam ribbed me for getting lost in Las Vegas, but I could do the same for him in whatever “city” this was. We drove through a business park until finding an AM-PM parking lot to brush our teeth and change clothes in. Back behind the steering wheel, I cruised the freeway to Hollywood Boulevard. I hadn’t been since I was seventeen. How does it look almost eight years later?

     Empty. Hardly anyone on the street. Not a soul on the sidewalk. I had expected LA to be a bustling town full of freaks and movie stars, especially here, at the Coast’s biggest tourist trap. But in the early hours of Sunday morning, we were driving through a ghost town. No Hollywood tours, no $20 photo ops, no excitement. The street was blocked off for a farmer’s market/Gay Pride festival. I could see sleepy citizens mosy through the open street under rainbow flags, but couldn’t get a good enough look to adequately tell what was going on. I hung a right on some street then hung a left and another right to get back to the Boulevard.

     We had passed all the landmarks. Pantages theater. Musso & Franks. Hollywood and Vine. Scientology headquarters. But the most notable one was the Chinese theater. It was much smaller than I had expected. The walk of fame was unimpressive. This is L.A.?

     The whole trip was building up to this: The Pacific ocean, the West Coast, American idealism sprawled across a super-urban area. And this was it: A town that could pass as any other town in America, but with more palm trees.

     Off the sunset strip, we drove through a multitude of ethnic villages. We passed under a bridge with a homeless camp, then a few blocks later, we were there. Within view of the Pacific Ocean.

     My nerves tingled with excitement. I pulled into a parking garage and drove to the only non-compact spaces, located on the top floor. We hid everything of value and locked the car up tight. A short walk later, and we were at the edge of the continent.

     The belief at the time was that you couldn’t get any further west. And culturally, this was true. Hispanic families watched their kids play in the surf as locals rode their bikes down the narrow path that cut through Venice Beach. I trudged through the soft sand in my Okie boots and stood at the dry line. There it is.

     An endless vista of blue. Nothing but water as far as the eye could see. Directly west was Japan, only a few thousand miles away. I plopped down and started writing in my journal, catching up on the last few frenetic days in Vegas. To my left, Sam was reading. Occasionally, I’d set my journal down and just look: Look at the sea, the children playing, the women walking.

     This is the other side of the American Dream: somewhere, in a flat a block away from Venice Beach is a young web designer, who had left it all behind in flyover country to be within view of the ocean. Waking up each day to the faint sound of waves crashing, spending the day in 70 degree ecstacy before watching the sun set on Asia over a glass of wine.

     This conception of paradise was far from the suburbs of San Bernardino, but effectively, it was the same: this was the end goal for someone: A place that they felt safe and satisfied. The long sought after attainment of luxury and peace.

     But I was just a tourist. Sam strolled down to the beach first. I let him experience the Pacific Ocean in his own way, while I reached down and dipped my hand into the salty water that rushed towards my boots.

     Before I had left for the trip, I had a coworker give me one of those silly cardboard cowboy hats with a beer brand plastered all over it. I didn’t particularly like the brand, so I won’t name it here, but she wanted me to wear it when I had made it to the Coast. I had completely forgotten about it until she texted me. I could go back to the car to retrieve it from the trunk, but it was almost eleven and we were getting hungry.

     We returned to the parking garage and the attendants were there. We tried to act casual, despite the fact we had paid and had every right to be there, but a desert-beaten ‘97 Lincoln Town Car with Oklahoma plates didn’t exactly fit in with the high-end compacts that filled the rest of the garage. One of the attendants guided us out and I steered us towards our next destination: In-N-Out.

     My mouth watered as I waited in line. It had been about a full day since we had eaten anything substantial. I ordered a burger and a shake and sat at a vacant table. Sam left for the bathroom. Across from me, what may or may not have been a homeless man talked loudly on his phone. Sam returned to the table holding back laughter. I glared at him as he giggled until I could no longer stand it.

     “What’s so fucking funny?”

     “Man, I’m listening to this guy in the stall next to me. And he goes “stop, stop! Oh, God. I just can’t do it. I just can’t!””

     “Good God. What the fuck?”

     “Constipation, maybe.” Sam said through laughter.

     “Or some kind of fucked up sex blackmail.”

     “Only in L.A.!”

     Los Angeles is the epicenter of weird, defying imagination and exceeding expectations. But I had no time to run through all of the hellish and hilarious scenarios transpiring in the men’s room: just then, the clerk called out our order numbers. We moved to the patio of the restaurant and chowed down. And oh my GOD was it good! I don’t know if it’s because In-N-Out is a genuinely impressive burger chain, or because we hadn’t eaten a solid meal in twenty four hours, but I scarfed my burger down and made it as far as I could into the chocolate shake without making myself sick.

     After we were finished, we crawled through slow 101 traffic to Will Rogers beach. I paid a flamboyant attendant fifteen dollars to get in, then searched for a parking space. I took my journal and rushed to the water’s edge. I kicked off my boots, sat in the sand, and wrote about Vegas. A particularly large wave rushed to shore and soaked my ass completely. I stood up quickly, laughing at myself and cursing, while Sam joined in laughing at me too.

     Well, fuck. I was already in it, I might as well embrace. I rolled up my pant legs as far as they would go, then tied my boots to my belt loop with the same red rag I had used on Savannah in Santa Fe. There I was, standing in the Pacific, writing in my journal.

     Sam came up for a cigarette, and after lighting one for myself, I handed him a Lucky Strike and the pink Playboy lighter I had picked up last October. He dropped his cigarette and searched frantically through the waves for it. I was laughing hysterically, saying “let it go, man! It’s just a cigarette! I have another one right here!”

     From the foamy water, he produced the lighter, sighing with relief as he tested it to make sure it still worked. He lit his cigarette and handed it back to me.

     “I was sure you would kill me if I lost your Playboy lighter.” he said.

     “Oh, shit! Ha ha! I thought you had dropped your cigarette. Oh, well, man. It’s just a lighter. In the words of Ken Kesey, “nothing lasts.””

     I tucked the lighter away and took a break from writing. We both stood there in the surf, taking in the full view of the Pacific as it rolled to shore in great waves, only to crash and rush gently to our feet, sweeping the sand out from under us as it receded quickly back into the ocean.

     “We should get ahold of Michele” Sam said. Austin’s mom lived in L.A. I didn’t know her as well, but Sam wanted to catch up with her. So he texted her and we spent the next half hour trying to guide her to where we were.

     My pants were soaked. I ducked into a public bathroom to change into my swim trunks, being careful not to put my feet on the piss-soaked floor. When I emerged, Sam had already found Michele. We found a spot on the beach to lay out, but I couldn’t stand being dry. I ran down to the water and let the waves wash over me.

     There’s only one way to get properly acquainted with the ocean, or any body of water for that matter: and it’s to dunk your head under the surface. Touching it or dipping your toes in doesn’t count. You have to be baptized by the surf, coming up from the salty blue a completely new person. So I waded into the cold water and let a wave knock me back, completely soaking my head and hair. This was it.

     REBIRTH. I emerged from the water and looked up at the skies, starting to turn clear blue from the fleeting clouds, then the beach, quickly filling up with people: locals and tourists alike. I stayed in the water for a bit, then retreated back to shore to dry off and warm up. David Lynch said it would be clear this morning in his daily weather forcast. As he had promised: blue skies and sunshine all the way. The sun drenched the beach as Michele and Sam talked.

     They had completely ignored me, as I had completely ignored them. Not out of spite or anything, we just had a silent, mutual understanding that I couldn’t contribute anything to the conversation. They were talking about college and what it was like to work in a library. Meanwhile, I was shivering and staring at the girls on Will Rogers Beach. Young mothers and girls my age. All well endowed in the best of areas, all scantily clad in bikinis and glistening in sunscreen. Sunscreen: that’s a good idea. I covered myself the best I could, then ran right back for the water. A group to my right had made a game of trying to swim through the waves as they came in. I did the same, but quickly got bored. I was more interested in the lone chick just a few yards away. I wanted to approach her, but I didn’t know what to say. She went back to shore, but I wanted to stay in the water for a bit longer.

     I’d keep up this cycle of returning to shore, then going back down, then coming back for awhile. Most times I was by myself. But once, a strange teenager approached me.

     “Hi. Where are you from?”

     “I’m from Norman, Oklahoma.”

     “Where’s that?”

     “It’s in the middle of Oklahoma. Just south of Oklahoma City.”

     “Where’s Oklahoma?”

     “It’s pretty far east of here. Just keep on I-40 until-”

     “Why are you here?”

     “I’m on a road trip with my friend.”

     “Why’d you come to L.A.?”

     And this interrogation went on and on. It was never hostile, I think he was just genuinely curious. He was a certified weirdo, typical of the coast, but I humored him anyway. I answered his questions and showed him how to dive beneath the waves as they came in.

     God, what great waves in L.A. The biggest ones were ten feet tall. You’d see them come in and swim towards them, letting your body be taken by them until you could stand up and you were back on the shore. And then you’d rush back in, waiting for the next monster wave to knock you back.

     Once I was tired of this, I came back onshore for good. The cold water didn’t bother me at first, but now it was frigid. I lay out on the blanket, trying to soak up as much sun as possible, frequently applying sunscreen to avoid burning.

     I must’ve missed the conversation before because suddenly, Michele bid us farewell, and around the same time, Sam and I decided it was time to leave too. It was five thirty. We’d been on the beach for five and a half hours. We went back to the car, took our wet jeans out from where they were hanging on the windows to dry, and lit cigarettes, deciding our next move.

     I hopped behind the wheel wearing an open Hawaiian shirt and swim trunks. I pushed the gas with a bare foot and took us into rush hour L.A. Sam booked us an Air BNB as we drove through Beverly Hills. Here, listening to “Bring a Little Lovin’” in a filthy old Town Car, speeding past mansions and manicured hedges, I truly felt like myself. Behind my shades and cigarette filter, I was no longer some lonely lube tech in Oklahoma. I was ME, in my environment, doing what I was born to do.

     After driving down streets I had recognized from James Ellroy novels, we ended up back on Hollywood Boulevard. Now it was lively. People crowded the sidewalks and cars packed the streets. Green lights. Street signs. Palm trees. LIFE! This is the L.A. I had come for. The last time I was here as a teenager, I was at the mercy of my family. But now that I was in my own car, doing it my own way, I felt like I was experiencing it for the first time.

     In Burbank, we passed by several studios.

     “Someday, these people are gonna buy my scripts.” I said.

     I took us to where Sam had guided us and got my bag out of the trunk. He walked over to a gate on the side of a house and said that our accommodations were in the backyard. I felt like we would be mistaken for burglars. Was he sure that this was the right house? He entered a code on the door and we were in.

     Two separate king sized beds, a kitchen, and a door that led to the bathroom. It was spacious. It made the hotel in Santa Fe look like a coat closet. We set our bags down and I showered first.

     Thank GOD! Warm water. A pleasant contrast compared to the icy Pacific. As I let the water rush over me, I found all the spots I hadn’t hit with sunscreen: my shoulders and my feet.

     Sam showered as I played with the cats outside, then I slipped on my boots and patch jacket, and then we were on the hunt for dinner. I drove us to a restaurant I had spotted earlier: “Dog Haus.” There was no parking anywhere. So we cruised around, passing a “Bob’s Big Boy,” also packed, and a “Carney’s.” Upon seeing all the open spaces, I whipped the car around and swung into the lot.

     We walked into the old Union Pacific train car and approached the counter. I ordered a chili burger and a vanilla shake. As I paid, I asked the man:

     “Where’s the nearest ATM and what’s the best place in town to catch a hardcore show?”

     “There’s an ATM at the gas station up the road. But I haven’t been to a hardcore show in YEARS.”

     “What?? This is L.A.!”

     As I turned and walked from the counter, I heard the man feebly say,

     “I live in Burbank.”

     Burbank, Glendale: it’s all L.A.

     Sam and I ate our chili burgers and I had the best vanilla shake I had ever had EVER before leaving for the ATM at the gas station. There was a sign on the door, indicating that the attendant was on break. As I jacked the car into reverse, he came to the door and took down the sign. I paid cash for a pack of Spirits, then turned back for Culver’s. My boot heels slammed hard against the floor as I approached the counter and slipped a five dollar bill into the tip jar. A young man looked at me puzzledly.

     “I forgot my cash.”

     Having taken care of my working class brethren, I headed for the door and set my GPS for “King Eddie’s.”

     We drove into the setting sun until we found an on-ramp to the highway. Sure, it was bumper-to-bumper traffic, but it MOVED. Even with the highway packed, I never drove under forty miles per hour. Sam and I blasted Agent Orange, chaining menthols. We made it to skid row and found a parking space two blocks up from the venue. This is where it hit me.

     I limped down fifth street. My feet were killing me. I guess the burn on the beach had affected me more than I had thought. We reached the venue after walking (limping) down desolate streets and tried the door.

     “What the fuck?”

     “This place is closed. Been closed since last year” an old man offered. We walked back to the car and I couldn’t handle it anymore. I drove to a Rite-Aid and bought aloe vera for my aching feet. The sidewalks were CROWDED with people. I’m talking shoulder-to-shoulder, people EVERYWHERE. We drove up the streets of L.A., opting to stay off the congested highways. A gray Prius pulled up next to me and sped ahead down residential streets. We shared the same road for quite a few miles. He’d speed up, and out of pride, I’d speed up. There was NO WAY I would let my Lincoln be embarrassed by a fucking hybrid. He’d punch the gas, I’d punch the gas. Approaching a stoplight, I locked my brakes pulling up next to the bastard. I got a good look at the guy: Mexican-American, male, mid forties, medium build, glasses, short hair. Why the fuck does somebody’s dad wanna race so bad?

     After hearing the squeal of my tires when the light turned green, I decided that it wasn’t worth getting pulled over and let the fucker go. He sped off and I languished. We ended up back on Hollywood Boulevard and I finally got what I had come for:

     Young locals lined the streets. Mexican girls and skinny white guys, shuffling to destinations unknown on the most well-known street in America. I wanted so badly to park and see where they were heading, to drink with the locals, become one with the culture.

     I had missed my opportunity in Vegas. I never made it to the Double Shot Saloon or any of the other local watering holes, so this was a chance at redemption. But my feet hurt so fucking bad I couldn’t bear the thought of walking any more. Besides, even if I could walk and go into the local bars of L.A., I’d still be an outsider. And as an outsider, you could never EXPERIENCE L.A. It was only meant to be seen. Projected onto a movie screen, or streamed to your TV. If you weren’t local, you could never engrain yourself into the culture. You could never be a part of it. You could only observe, watch, imitate. It’s all TV, meant to be consumed and copied.

     Back at the Air BNB, I peeled my boots off in agony and applied the aloe vera. I wrote for as long as I could, then sleep took me. I felt bad. Guilty even. I had robbed Sam of an experience because of my own weakness. This was his first night in L.A. and all I could do was bitch about my feet.

 BUMMER

     BURBANK, CALIFORNIA

     JUNE 13TH, 2022

     I woke up around the same time Sam did, remembering last night’s agony. I dreaded standing up. We ambled around our quarters and slowly loaded up the car for our next destination: Fresno.

     I couldn’t help but notice an odd tension while packing my things. The room we had occupied was silent. Cold. I knew I had robbed Sam of a unique experience, just as I knew he wouldn’t hold it against me. But there was nothing I felt like saying. And there was nothing I felt like doing, even if I could do anything. Behind the wheel, I lit up a cigarette and cruised us towards the highway. The silent attitude of the car could be captured with “yeah, well, what’s next?”

     Instead of going directly towards Fresno, we were going to take the 101 up to Santa Barbara for breakfast, then stop into Solvang, Pismo Beach, and Cholame. After that, we’d be at the mercy of central California, where the highways would be much less scenic, but relatively empty.

     “I think I’ve figured it out.”

     “What’s that?” Sam asked.

     “You have to drive as aggressively as everyone else. Last night on the freeway, you remember how traffic was bumper to bumper, but no one drove less than forty miles per hour? That wouldn’t even be heard of in Oklahoma! It’s because everyone wants to keep moving. This city moves fast. Slow down, get run over. It was the same way in Vegas” I said

     “And where does L.A. go to play on the weekend?” he asked.

     “Exactly! Everyone in L.A. drives like they’re deliberately trying to hit you, so you have to adapt and do the same thing. Drive with a vengeance. If you can drive here, you can drive anywhere.”

     Camarillo, Oxnard, finally within view of the ocean at Ventura. We were blasting punk all the way. To our right were lush coastal hills. To our left was choppy, navy blue water, covered by gray skies. I interrupted the punk with “Outta Time” and it captured the vibe completely. The sun came out as soon as we hit Santa Barbara. I could only remember two things about this town: one, there was a gas station that sold unfiltered Strikes. Two, there was a restaurant on the beach with some of the best fish and chips I’d ever had.

     I slipped on my sandals and limped down lively alleys, crowded with Monday morning pier traffic; mostly fisherman and tourists. At the restaurant, we were greeted by the hostess, who took us upstairs to the balcony. I sat with a view of the mountains and let Sam have a view of the ocean. I asked our waitress where I could wash up, and she directed me to a public bathroom downstairs. Up the fucking stairs, down the fucking stairs. And I’ll have to go up the fucking stairs again! For what?? Just to descend them one final, fatal time? By the time I was done going up and down, my feet would swell beyond their skin. They’d split open like baked potatoes, viscera exploding onto the sidewalk and nearby tourists, while fish frenzied over the lone bit that made it into the water.

     Even this nightmare fantasy wasn’t as gross as the bathroom I had stepped into. There was a green tinge coming from the overhead light, creating an otherworldly atmosphere among the filthy stalls and wet tile floor. I ran the water and- no soap. My hands would have been less dirty had I stayed upstairs. But no. For the sake of cleanliness I struggled down the stairs and now I will have to struggle back up the stairs, having used nothing more than warm tap water to wash my hands.

     At least the fish and chips were good. I stuffed myself and hobbled back to the car after Sam finished his plates. And now, Solvang. More gorgeous coastal highways until the 101 turned inland. After gassing up in Buellton, I traded off. He drove us into neighboring Solvang, the little faux Dutch town with its gardens and windmills and old European architecture. I sat in the passenger seat trying to guess what was beyond those dark storefront windows, imagining all I was missing out on. Free beer, indoor gun ranges, strip clubs. Probably not. Solvang strikes me as the kind of place your grandma goes with her knitting club every third month. It’s all antique stores, overpriced restaurants, niche hobby shops, and handmade furniture stores. Sam seemed blown away. I was busy thinking about my feet.

     We backtracked to Buellton, then headed inland. Every few miles was a vinyard, with rows of grapes stretching from the highway all the way back to some multi-million dollar facility off in the distance, where rich young couples from L.A. pretended to be intrigued by the cellar tours.

     We barely made it to Pismo Beach before the pain killed me. I kicked off my sandals and waded into the surf. I don’t recall it being a good day for waves. Over to the right was the boardwalk: an elevated row of surf shops, souvenir stores, and fair food vendors. Would we be walking those weathered, brown boards, listening to the water crash onto the shore beneath us? Hell no. My feet were so fucked up not even the icy water could help them. As soon as I was back at the car, they were hurting again. I gave Sam the keys and wallowed in the passenger seat, pulling up directions for our next destination: Fresno.

     We turned inland and I said goodbye to the beach for good. I was pretty bummed. The whole way out, I had listened to the same damned surf playlist on repeat, pretending that the desert sand that started in the far western tip of Oklahoma and stretched through New Mexico, Arizona, Nevada, and California ended at the beach. This was IT! This was the DREAM! Crashing our way across the U.S. until reaching the Big Blue, just to burn myself as soon as I got there.

     Though, I should be optimistic. The journey is ten times worth the destination. And, in the end, I got what I wanted. I took in too much too fast and this was the result: sore, burning feet and a dour attitude that I masked behind silence.

     More Vinyards and vast gold nothing until Cholame. A single tree grew in memorial to James Dean, who was killed at this spot in 1955. He was twenty-four. The same age I was now. A spot along a cattle fence was littered with flowers, license plates, bras, and garbage. I only hope my death spot would look the same way.

     Rebel. Loner. Hero. I never knew much about James Dean when I was in high school, beyond the fact that he was some kind of outlaw youth that I wanted to be. Haunted, mysterious, troubled. I did my hair up in a pompadour every day and wore black cowboy boots with cuffed jeans to embody the same image he had created. I went out and bought myself an old navy peacoat just so I could look like him in that iconic picture, pouting over his shoulder with a cigarette hanging from his lips.

     As a young adult, I continued to do my hair the same way. Sometime back in my activist days, my friends and I were confronting some “Confederate Veterans” group. A bunch of old farts and racists sitting peacefully while some loser in a historical outfit lectured them on the importance of the confederate battle flag. Meanwhile, I was standing up on a barricade erected by the pigs to keep us from Civil War II, screaming “Y’ALL LOST! REMEMBER? SHERMAN DID NOTHING WRONG!”

     These so-called southerners did their best to ignore our hollers, shouts, and bullhorns, existing under the guise of safety because the “Confederate Mechanized Cavalry” showed up to protect them. It was nothing more than a bunch of elderly turds and racists sitting around on motorcycles. They weren’t even recognized as a “one-percenter” biker club. They lacked that coveted diamond patch indicating that they were capable of violence. Anything sporting the stars and bars hasn’t been violent since their castration some 150 or so years ago, against white men at least. Enough politics, I digress.

     Some shorthaired shithead called me out and pointed at me directly:

     “You know what? You look like a communist James Dean!” To this day, it is the highest compliment I had ever received. I turned around and declared that my friends must refer to me as such from now on. Sam pointed out that James Dean was a sex symbol, and I had never been so elated.

     I was finally a copy of my hero, and here I was, speeding past his death site without a damned thing aside from a Lucky Strike to lay upon his memorial. But we couldn’t stop. I couldn’t walk! We continued down endless miles of dry farmland until reaching a lone town in the middle of nowhere.

     “Let’s pull in to that “In-N-Out” Sam suggested.

     I almost argued against it, but we had been on the road for a long time, and I wasn’t going to deny that I wanted a shake. And that’s just what we ordered. Compared to “Carney’s,” this strawberry shake was close, but no cigar. We crossed through more hours of farmland with the windows down, blasting punk and lighting the occasional cigarette. On the outskirts of Fresno, I texted my grandparents and directed Sam to their address.

     Their gated trailer community wasn’t hard to find, but the street they lived on was. I misdirected Sam, but we eventually ended up at our stop for the night. My grandpa came out to greet us, recognizing Sam from the last time we had stopped here last summer, then led us inside.

     We stowed our bags, and my grandfather, ever the Okie, offered us dinner at Texas Roadhouse. I changed into my boots and my “nice” shirt, the black one with the embroidered roses on the shoulders, then, for reasons to this day I still cannot fathom, took separate cars to the restaurant two blocks away. My feet started to hurt, but I limped inside with confidence.

     Standing was agony. I held the door open for the biggest fucking family in all of Fresno, faking a smile, then continued to stand as all the benches were full. I rocked my feet back and forth, hoping for some kind of relief, but it felt like all the blood in my body was settling at my feet.

     Finally, a table was ready for us, at the very back it felt like, and we slid into the booth, looking over the menu. My grandparents interviewed Sam about his schooling and his job, then asked us both about the trip we had made so far. We watered it down to the PG version, then listened to my grandpa tell stories from all of his roadtrips.

     As soon as my plate hit the table, I knew I was in for disappointment: A huge plate of dry pulled pork that not even BBQ sauce could save. I shoved a forkful into my mouth and braced for the bite to hit my stomach. I couldn’t even focus on my meal, my feet were hurting so bad. It had been about 24 hours since noticing the burn, and my pain was peaking. My feet swelled up, restrained within my boots, which, to this day, still don’t fit quite as snug. I bought a half-size down, knowing that the material would eventually wear out, but at this point, the boots were essentially brand-new, still smelling strongly of leather, and still tight on my feet.

     Why, oh WHY, did I buy a size down? Why did I wear these fucking boots!? They’re under the table, no one was looking at my footwear, why did I wear these? The misery compounded with every bite of stale pulled pork and I prayed that this whole ordeal would be over soon. Every second that passed, my feet burned hotter and hotter, until I was convinced that they’d burst into flames, further ruining this awful meal. The Texas Roadhouse of Fresno was becoming my own personal Hell.

     Finally, our food was packed away into to-go containers and I was standing up for the first time. I felt as if I were going to collapse. I passed by tables full of ugly, smiling families, then plopped back into my own driver’s seat.

     “Sam, this is awful. I don’t know why I wore the boots. How was your chicken fried steak? My pulled pork was fucking awful. Not even “Head and Country” could fix this.”

     I navigated back to the trailer park, bitching the entire way, then took a seat on the couch. My grandma offered me her walker to rest my feet on, and I had no other choice. If I’d pulled my boots off now the skin would come off with them. I’d pass out from the pain. So, no. I rested my boots on the walker and let a nearly seventy-year-old offer me expensive lotion to rub on my feet as soon as the blood had drained from them.

     And it did. I could feel it. My feet felt like sandwich bags full of lava that was slowly being pulled back into my body. After half an hour, I slowly and agonizingly pulled my boots off. My feet looked like shit. They were swelled up to the point of bursting, and I was afraid that if I put my feet back on the floor, they would.

     I distracted myself by talking to my grandfather. Before Kesey or Thompson or Kerouac, he was the original inspiration for my road trip. Once when I was nine, and once when I was ten, he drove me all over the West, hitting museums and points of interest all over. He was the first to impart upon me the love of the Road. But now I was twenty four, with my own car and my own music. Control. I decided when we would leave, where we were going, and how fast we would get there.

     Beyond his enthusiasm for driving, I didn’t know much about him. Sam and I gravitated towards him and his stories of being a traveling salesman in the seventies, eighties, and nineties, driving all across the U.S. selling tools to various companies. He’d celebrated his success with nice houses and modern cars before hitting the road and doing it all over again. He saw it as a competition. He lived for the thrill of making a sale: winning. Until one day, he thought, “what if someone is doing the same thing to me?” Was he being sold something? Were the talking heads on the TV enticing him into a way of life he never truly believed?

     These words stuck: “I have no regrets- though if I could do it different: I’d narrow my scope to the things that mattered. The things I could control.”

     He was a rare, and perhaps, final testament to the American Dream from a time when the American dream was still viable. He’d lived it, he’d liked it, but I get the feeling he knew there was more beyond the thin veil keeping the populace in check.

     Where did I fall? I tried to pursue it and briefly found it, but was repulsed. It nearly left me in a waking grave. Does the initial stink wear off? Does it get better? I would never find out because I ran from it. He ran to it.

     He embraced it and he’s all the better for it. But he, I, and maybe all of us, recognize that there’s so much more beyond the filthy facade, and the thing actually worth pursuing is different for every person. No two trips are the same. They may rhyme, but harmony rarely exists. And regardless of whether or not it does, the tune is subject to change. He had heard the song and he had done the dance, but I can tell in his voice that he knows that there’s more to life that the illusion we’ve been sold.

     Would he have kept running? Who knows. Truth be told, I think Grandma Dottie wrangled him in. It makes me wonder if Savannah could do the same for me, if she’s even mine.

     After listening to my grampa’s stories, I showered and turned in for the night, keeping my feet elevated on a pillow. Cool wind came in through the open window and a fan lazily circulated the air through the room. As I drifted off, my grandmother’s voice echoed in my head, reminding my grandpa of all the boots he needed to get rid of. But my feet were too swollen to try them on.

     Damn it. Damn all of it! My most basic mode of transportation: stolen. My feet were useless. I hoped that they’d be better the next day and that the lotion I was constantly applying would help them heal. But for now, anything involving standing or walking was a special kind of Hell I had not yet encountered.

     Misery as my only company, I let the dull pain lull me to sleep.

THE BEGINNING OF THE END

     FRESNO, CALIFORNIA

     JUNE 14TH, 2022

     Through the open window, cool California air crept in. I lay awake under the sheets, wondering if today was the day my feet would start to heal. Placing them on the ground and taking a few cautious steps around the room, the dull pain simmered on the tops of both feet.

     Today was not that day.

     I got dressed, then met my grandparents and Sam in the living room. They’d made up a big breakfast for us, buffet style. All the biscuits and gravy we could ask for, more than I could stomach. I felt wasteful finishing my single plate with so much food left in the kitchen, but after days on end of eating a single meal and some snacks, a full meal might cause my stomach to burst.

     My grandmother packed us some sandwiches, made with my leftovers from the night before, and by nine thirty, we were back on the road. I got us out of Fresno and into Madera. I sat on the trunk while pumping gas, then crawled into the backseat, handing Sam the keys.

     I stretched the seatbelt across myself and sat my heels on the armrest. That took the pressure off and made my feet feel better, but as soon as I took them down to look out the window, they’d start hurting again. I was a pretty pathetic sight. I texted Savannah for a bit, letting her know where we were, where we were going, and how I was doing, then stared up into the blue sky, assuming that eventually we’d make it to Jamestown.

     Sam parked in a gravel lot and I reluctantly put my shoes on. The National Hotel was only a block down. I had been waiting since I was a kid to return to the infamous hotel, namely for the macaroni and the ghost stories.

     Arriving at the front door, we found a sign stating that they were closed. Fuck! We’d come all this way just for them to be closed. Disappointed, I turned towards the car.

     “Well, we’re not getting in. So I might as well tell you now: The National Hotel is haunted by the ghost of Flo.” And through bared teeth, limping back to the car, I told Sam the story as simply as I could:

     “Florence, called Flo, was moving to San Francisco to be with family. On the way, she meets this guy. So instead of going to Frisco, they decide to get married at the next stop: Jamestown. They spend a few days here, planning their wedding, then- Fuck! Why’d this have to be uphill?  Naw, I’m alright. It’s just a bit further. Fuck! Anyway, so the morning of the big day, the husband-to-be is coming down the stairs. The town drunk comes in and shoots him. Bam! Square in the chest! Guy dies right in front of her. So she locks herself in her room and for three days, cried non-stop. Until one day, she goes silent. They sent a doctor up to her room and the doctor says she died of heart failure… A broken heart.”

     After recounting Flo’s origin story as true as I could, we walked past the car and crossed a street that traffic never stopped coming down into the parking lot of a dollar store. I bought some cheap Ibuprofen and dry swallowed two pills on the sidewalk.

     Back in the car, I let Sam take the wheel again and we were off. He was going to navigate us to Eugene, Oregon, to visit Lydia until my feet were hopefully healed and we could hike Pariah Canyon. I lay back down in the backseat and tried to eat a pulled pork sandwich. Cold and without barbeque sauce, but it was sufficient.

     We passed through a few villages, then out of Gold Country, we continued on to Sacramento.

     This is where we got the bad news. Sam was navigating city streets back onto the highway after missing an exit, while I was taking a call from Lydia. She anxiously told me she tested positive for COVID and it wouldn’t be a good time for us to visit. Sam got us straightened out by the time I hung up the phone.

     “What’s the word?” he asked.

     “Not good. Lydia has Covid.” I replied.

     “So we won’t be staying with her?”

     “Not unless you wanna get Covid before going down into Pariah Canyon.”

     “Well shit. What are we going to do?”

     We both knew damn well that we had no other choice. We couldn’t go straight to Pariah Canyon with my feet being in as bad a shape as they were, and we couldn’t afford to linger around anywhere until they got better. We kicked the idea of Portland and Chicago around, but we were burning up money fast. Plus, I was too exhausted and crippled to do much else anyway.

     Pariah Canyon was off. The trip was over.

     “We hit San Fran, and then we go home.” I declared.

     And for the last time, we turned the car west, and headed for the Golden Gate. Originally, we were going to drop down the 101 from Oregon into San Francisco, then turn towards Pariah Canyon after staying in Eugene. But now that the canyon wasn’t an option, we would go straight to San Fran, then make a break for home.

     I texted Tanner and Colin, knowing they’d be as disappointed as we were, then took in the views as I lost cell service. We cruised down two-lane country highways, past tall hills covered in golden grass that glowed in the sun. Eventually, these golden hills gave way to greener vegetation and the highway turned into interstate. The interstate took us to a city and dropped us directly into afternoon traffic. A few hills beyond a body of water was to our right, with the water creeping closer until we were on a bridge.

     And I thought the views of the countryside were interesting! I snapped a few pictures and climbed into the front seat. The San Francisco skyline was visible just ahead, a myriad of gray-shaded rectangles against the pale blue sky. Look man! That’s Alcatraz! And the big pyramid building! Where’s the Golden Gate Bridge?

     The highway quickly dissolved into city streets, which we cruised mouth agape. Immediately, Sam was in love. An urbanist who was constantly urging me to go to Chicago, he swooned over the preserved antique architecture and grid pattern streets. We found a CVS to pull into for sunburn lotion and- Hey! The ibuprofen worked!

     After applying the lotion, I hopped behind the wheel and drove us around a bit more, playing Ty Segall’s live version of “Feel” while we rolled up and down the hills of the singer’s home turf. Uphill was so steep, I couldn’t see over the Lincoln’s massive hood and had to assume that the intersection was clear before rolling forward.

     We found a place to park somewhere in Russian Hill, packing EVERYTHING into the trunk as to avoid the break-in that we had been warned so much about. Even my grandparents said San Francisco had changed for the worst. Aside from these reasonable precautions, we didn’t care.

     We walked down to a corner store for cigarettes, then continued on to Fisherman’s Wharf. I knew it would be this way, but it’s appalling to see it happen in front of your very eyes: Tourist central. The sidewalks were crowded with brightly dressed people from all over. Rental cars and bikes filled the street. But how were we any different? Sam pointed at the big “Fisherman’s Wharf” sign and said, “give me your best tourist impression and I’ll get your picture!”

     I turned my head this way and that, mouth agape, impressed by nothing in particular. I didn’t think I looked like a tourist at all. I’d probably blend in better with the local homeless. I hadn’t shaved since… God, I can’t even remember. My clothes probably smell as raggedy as they look, but they’re masked by the musk of nicotine.

     We hung out on the pier, looking out at Alcatraz and the sailboats, then I got a selfie with a seagull before we headed back into the gridded city.

     Downhill was fine. Uphill, and I thought I was back on Black Mesa. My thighs were still a little sore. On level ground at Hyde street, I found a book in the gutter. I carried it to a bar we found solace in on Polk street, just south of Vallejo: The Buccaneer.

     We stepped into the pirate themed bar and took a seat. It’s not particularly hot in San Francisco, but it felt nice to be out of the sun. I looked at the bartender and knew that a place like this HAD to have what I hadn’t had since Santa Fe: “I’d like a PBR, please.”

     “You want it in the can?”

     “I do, working class style.”

     Sam ordered the same and the red, white, and blue tallboy was just what the doctor had ordered. I dismissed myself to the cramped bathroom and was met with a welcome sight: stickers and graffiti. The mark of any good bar. From the other side of the door, I heard from the group playing pool: “There’s a reason we live in San Francisco. It’s to party, all the time!”

     I strolled out of the bathroom and retook my place at the bar. Sam was giving my book a very skeptical look.

     “You know this woman endorsed Hillary, right?”

     “What the fuck? No! I’ll put it back if that’s the case.”

     “Yeah… I don’t think this is a good book. It’s not revolutionary.”

     Too bad. I needed to finish “Desert Oracle” anyway. So I tabbed out and penned within the cover:

     “My name is Tate. I’m from Norman, Oklahoma on a roadtrip with my friend Sam. We’ve been to Santa Fe, Las Vegas, Los Angeles, and ended up here. We might go to Portland before going to Chicago. I found this book on the sidewalk of Hyde street. I thought it would be an interesting read, but this author isn’t revolutionary. She endorsed Clinton, for fuck’s sake. Toss this book and git yerself something radical! Try the autobiography of Malcom X instead.” Signed, The Okies.

     We left the bar and went right back to where we found the book. I placed it in a doorway and we headed back to the car. I was dried out, but still frayed. I dropped into drive and followed Sam’s directions to the hostel. We had to circle the block a few times to find parking, but eventually found a lot with an attendant. We pulled our bags out of the trunk as I handed the man the keys and gave him my name. I was worried that the car would be broken into, but tried to console myself with the fact that the interior was CLEAN, aside from cellophane cigarette wrappers and discarded receipts.

     We took our bags and walked up the alley, then the sidewalk, then another alley to our home for the night: The Adelaide Hostel. Sam checked us in and we found our bunks in our dorm.

     The benefit was that our bunks were right by the door. The drawback was that it was right by the door. A lot of traffic would pass us by that night, stealing our shit or waking us up. I threw my bag in my bunk and closed the curtains. The front desk was all out of locks for the stowage drawers below, but my bag wouldn’t’ve fit anyway.

     So I left my journal, my clothes, my lotion, and everything else I owned just short of my phone and wallet on a mattress behind a thin curtain. We hit the streets and I tried to forget this grim reality. We found a bar at the corner: Owl Tree. It had a cozy mid-century vibe. I ordered a rum and we took our seats at a booth tucked into the back.

     “A toast… To San Francisco.”

     “To San Francisco.”

     The clinking of our glasses together would mark the start of a night of pure, absolute debauchery.

     We found another bar. A quiet dive not too far away from the Owl. We got a Corona each and spoke with the bartender. This scene was dead. We hit the streets again, giving cigarettes to the homeless, and ended up in another place. Then another. I was so drunk by this point, any more alcohol would make me sick. I ordered a water and tried to uncross my eyes to focus on the TV. They were playing some movie where Chevy Chase goes to Las Vegas. I was back in Vegas. I recognized all the landmarks. There’s Treasure Island. Caesar’s Palace. We’re not in Vegas. We’re in San Francisco. I found a bathroom, then I was ready to leave. Sam led me to a pizza joint. It was about eight feet wide. We got a slice each and I started to sober up. I had no idea where we were. I didn’t really care. I was drunk and free in San Francisco. I didn’t care about tomorrow or the hangover that would accompany it. I didn’t care that this was our last night before heading home. I didn’t care about anything other than another cigarette and finding some place to sleep.

     Suddenly, I was back at the hostel, in the common cafeteria. There was a group of strangers surrounding us, every person from a different country. One guy from China, one from Syria, a cute redhead from Turkey. I’d made it a point to act like a blatant stereotype. How much did a European know about Oklahoma? I put on my thickest drawl and started telling tales. I don’t even remember what about, but we had that table’s full attention. They all leaned forward as I told the story of how we drank in Vegas and saw my romance in Santa Fe, and how I burned my feet in “Los Angel-ese” and how I couldn’t even fit into my boots anymore. I declared that we’d be heading back up to the Owl, and there were no takers aside from one or two people, unfortunately discluding the Turkish girl.

     Outside the hostel, Sam and I smoked cigarettes, waiting for our friends. One popped their head out the door, declaring that they changed their mind. Damn! We were in this alone. No matter! We hit the streets and found the Owl.

     We tried to retake our seats at the back, but they were occupied. We found a table next to a young couple and their friend. The girl was in ecstasy, giggling and smiling ear-to-ear. The guy was head-on-the-table passed out. I leaned over to the girl.

     “Is he alright?”

     “Yeah, yeah, he’s fine” the girl giggled back.

     “Are you sure? Can I get y’all anything? Waters, maybe?”

     “No, no, we’re fine, we’re fine.”

     I sat with my drink, but an instinctive part of me said to take action. It felt like the couple in Vegas all over again. I turned to Sam:

     “Hey, I’m gonna grab us some waters. For both of them too.” I stood up and went for the bar. Stumbling there, a woman was dancing alone. She looked at me and asked,

     “Is that how to do it? Do you know how to dance to this?”

     “Oh, miss, you’re askin’ the wrong person! I can’t dance to nothin’!”

     She laughed at me and I waited for the bartender to return. They were completely occupied with the packed bar.

     “Look, I think you know how to dance to this.” I told her. “You’re doing just fine! At the very least, you have me fooled.” 

     She laughed again, exposing a wide, gap-toothed smile, exploiting a fatal weaknesses.

     “What’s your name?” this gap-toothed stranger asked.

     “Tate… Davis. My friend and I are here from Norman, Oklahoma.”

     “I’m Shanelle. Like, Chanel, but with a S H.”

     “What are you drinking Shanelle? That looks good.”

     “Chardonnay. It’s my favorite.”

     “Ooh, alright…” Just then the bartender approached us. “Howdy! Could I get a Chardonnay for the lady and a… Miller High Life for myself, please.” The bartender turned to pour our drinks as my new friend questioned me further.

     “You came here from Oklahoma, what are you doing in San Francisco?”

     “We’re on a big road trip and this is one of the stops. My friend’s never been, and I wanted to see what it was like since I’d been here last. I heard this town knows how to party, so really, we’re out just trying to see what we can see… So, what’s it like living in San Francisco?”

     “I don’t live in San Francisco. I live in Oakland, across the bay.”

     “If you live in Oakland, what are you doing all the way out here?”

     And that fatal answer:

     “I’m here looking for the same thing you are…”

     I’m only a man. I’m fairly oblivious. But I know when someone is  flirting with me, and my most basic instincts said that she was. Sam approached and stood at the bar next to us. I had completely forgotten about him, the waters, and everything else beyond that. Right now I was wedged between the gap in this stranger’s teeth. Had I gone out the door with this tall, black vixen, my dead Confederate ancestors would be pissing in their graves.

     I introduced the two after Sam tabbed out, and he asked for a cigarette. I obliged him and followed him out the door. Shanelle was waiting on another drink I ordered for her.

     “Hey, what the fuck was that? You tell me you’re going to get us waters and the next thing I know, you’re talking with some lady.” he demanded.

     “Yeah, man. Her name’s Shanelle, I bought her a chardonnay. She’s cool” I replied nonchalantly.

     Sam needed no explanation. He knew what was going on even before I did.

     “You should really think about what you’re doing. Is Savannah okay with this?”

     “I don’t know. She never said whether or not we were exclusive.”

     “You should clarify that first. Think about what you’re doing.” he declared authoritatively.

     “Alright man, fine, I’ll be careful… Here, take these.” I then handed Sam a mostly empty pack of American Spirits, the pink playboy lighter, some crumpled up ones, and whatever the hell else was in my pockets. He took off in the direction of the hostel and I took in the night air.

     People flew in all directions around us. Cars sped by and ran red lights. I was at the mercy of the city and this siren was my guide. I didn’t know what my intentions with her were, I was just pushing to see how far I could get. I didn’t have a place to take her, certainly not the hostel. So I figured I wouldn’t get far. Even if I could, would I? I wasn’t alone for long before Shanelle came out of the bar. She lit up a Marlboro Gold and talked me up some more. We smoked and flirted until she flicked her cigarette so hard it flew from her hand. I picked it up and stuffed it into my filter. Shanelle suddenly broke in:

     “Do you have any cash?”

     “Cash? Why, do you need help paying for parking?” Then the realization hit me: Shanelle was a prostitute. She had been soliciting me.

     “Look, I don’t pay for that sort of thing.” I smiled coyly.

     “What?”

     “I don’t pay for it, sorry.”

     “That’s okay, we’re still friends.” she smiled. She turned around and went right back to work inside, looking for her next victim. Meanwhile, I was left alone in the night.

     I was embarrassed. I was flattered that someone who looked like THAT would flirt with ME of all people, but no. I’m not that special. This was strictly transactional. She saw me as the drunk sucker that I was, but I had just enough dignity and shame to say “no.”

     That’s the other thing; shame. Sam’s words were still echoing in my head and I started to realize how wrong all of this was. I tried to imagine Savannah’s reaction and what I saw wasn’t good. I knew she’d be disappointed in me and I was disappointed in myself. I kept dragging Shanelle’s cigarette, imagining the consequences I deserved had I actually taken it further. The din of traffic and chaos echoed around me.

     Some guy nearby was a sort of switchboard for skinny young men. They’d run up to him and ask: “have you seen Jim?” and he’d reply, “no, Jim’s dead.” Man after man after man. And this stranger leaning against the streetlamp was just trying to finish his phone call. When he did, I tried asking him what sights were left to see in San Francisco, where the music was at. But the incessant men, pestering him like flies, kept approaching. All asking about Jim.

     He quickly walked off and I started to wonder who Jim was. I could go back to the bar to finish my drink, and maybe if I hung around long enough, I’d find out. But I didn’t want anything to do with that bar or any of what was happening inside anymore. And I started to feel even worse because I never got a water for that man passed out on the table, letting lust get in the way of charity. I’d had enough of this night and enough of myself.

     I turned toward the hostel and descended the narrow stairs into the basement. I poured myself a cup of water from the tap and sat at the long table, alone with a young European man named Felix and a man from China named Dave. I put on a show for them, but I was truly exhausted. I just wanted to drink enough water to save me from tomorrow’s hangover and maybe sober up enough to avoid the spins tonight.

     As I was telling Felix about drinking beer and watching for tornadoes, Sam walked in. We both exchanged surprised looks.

     “What the fuck are you doing here?” we asked simultaneously.

     “I could ask you the same thing, I thought you were already in bed” I answered first.

     “In San Francisco? Not a chance. I spent my night walking around and giving cigarettes to homeless people.”

     The whole room chatted for a bit, but the exhaustion took over and I had no other choice but to crawl into bed. I knew this town would wear me out, but I never imagined it would be like this. 

NOWHERE LEFT TO GO

     SAN FRANCISCO, CALIFORNIA

     JUNE 15TH, 2022

     I peek past the curtain as the dim glow of daylight creeps into the narrow room. It’s early. I’m tired. But not hungover. My feet still hurt though. I elevate them on my bag to take some of the pressure off. I’m stuck here until the swelling goes down. I listen to the silent breaths of the other travelers and their occasional stirring. The calm is suddenly broken by a frustrated voice.

     “You are retarded! Playing kid’s games! You don’t have half the accomplishments I do. You have no balls.”

     I stifle my laughter and listen on. I start to feel bad for the person on the other end of this call, being condescended by someone in the basement of a San Francisco hostel.

     I change clothes in my bunk and sloooooowly lower myself onto the linoleum floor. Damn, I hate walking. Damn I hate this sunburn! I felt fine last night, but I’m paying for it today. I stumble into the kitchen and join Dave for breakfast. Felix was disappointingly absent, as well as a lot of my friends from last night. Have they all already left? Or are they still asleep? I eat a quick breakfast, then crawl back into my bunk to take some Ibuprofen. I meet Sam and we start getting ready to leave. Surprisingly, nothing was taken from my bag last night.

     Back on the street, we’re waiting for the car. The attendant directs us to the hotel next door to pay as he goes to pull it up. Inside, the dark walls were adorned with elegant, expensive paintings and gold candelabra light fixtures. I approach the marble counter and hand the woman my parking slip. I look around as she rings up the charges. Well-dressed and clean-cut strangers zoomed through the lobby like cars on the highway, rushing to get to the board meeting their boss signed them up for or to interview for a well-paying silicon valley job, or whatever it is these people do. I haven’t worked in weeks. I stand before them in cheap boat shoes and blue jeans. The lady hands me the charges and I nearly scream. Seventy-two fucking dollars. To park overnight. The car had better be clean inside and out, and the lot attendant armed with a machine gun for how much I paid. I met Sam at the car, threw my shit in the back, and sped off towards the wharf.

     Food was our first priority. But the fish-n-chips place wouldn’t be open for another thirty minutes. Sam led me to the pier, walking all the way to the end of a wooden dock. My feet felt worse and I was counting the minutes until the Ibuprofen kicked in. I sat up on the railing, watching the water churn below me and the cooks smoke behind a restaurant. The dock was completely empty aside from us. Even the noise of the city seemed to go silent as a show of respect for this moment. Enough time had passed and we found a place in the shade at “The Cod Mother.”

     “Awful quiet over there. Whatcha thinkin’?” Sam asked.

     “About last night. That was the drunkest I’d been in a long time. Since Vegas at least.” I replied. Vegas was four days ago.

     “Yeah, that was wild… About last night. What happened with that chick?”

     “I didn’t hang out with her any more. I went back to the hostel to sober up. What did you do?”

     “I walked around and gave cigarettes to homeless people. They had some interesting stories, some of them… So, why didn’t you stay and talk to her?”

     “She was a prostitute.” I answered plainly.

     He burst out laughing as I sat there ashamed. He kept howling until I saw the humor and started laughing too.

     “I don’t really need it. But I’m sure as hell not going to pay for it, even if I did!”

     “I can’t believe it! You got solicited by a prostitute in San Francisco!”

     “If you’re gonna come here, you might as well get the full experience. But I don’t want to take anything home with me. Besides, I’ve already got someone. I don’t need a prostitute.”

     The laughter slowly wound down and the air became silent.

     “Yeah, you should really think about that man. What that means for Savannah.”

     “I know. I should…” There would be plenty of time to think on the drive to Oklahoma, I wasn’t going to let it occupy my thoughts on our final day in San Francisco. “Anyway. You ever been inside a submarine?”

     We gave the man our money and descended the staircase at the stern of the sub: the USS Pampanito. We descended into a room bordered by pipes, knobs, and handwheels. At the very back of the room was four bronze hatches, each bearing a little Japanese flag, indicating that each launch tube had scored a hit in the Pacific Theater. Yellow-tipped torpedoes sat on rails behind the tubes, primed to be loaded and fired at the SS Jeremiah O’Brien to our rear.

     We crawled through a tiny hatch to the maneuvering room, filled with gauges, dials, levers, cranks, and switches. All of the controls to make the Pampanito move. Overhead were giant white pipes with screens at the end, their purpose being to pump cool air into the room. I could only imagine how hot it got with all of this pre-microchip equipment running all at once.

     The next hatch led to the aft engine room. More levers, dials, and pipes, then two long gray diesel engines across from each other in the narrow passageway. Giant intakes lay at the far end, primed to suck in air through the air intake hatch above. Two puny fans hung above the 10 cylinder beasts.

     “Do you think those fans made much of a difference in here?”

     “Not at all. I wish they were running now.”

     Then through the forward engine room, similarly filled with dials, pipes, and wheels. Then onto a room where the dials and wheels had been replaced with green bunks. This room was somehow more claustrophobic than the last, with the narrow walkways forming a maze around all thirty six beds. Through an even narrower door was the galley. Four small tables to eat the food cooked next door, in the kitchen no bigger than a walk-in closet. For such a small area, there was a lot of equipment. A mixer, coffee machine, two ovens, and a surprising amount of workspace. I could only imagine how crowded this kitchen could get working continuously to feed a crew of eighty men.

     Through the next hatch was the radio room. Another claustrophobic mess of dials, knobs, gauges, buttons, switches, and of course, pipes and tubes. But the next room was even more visually overwhelming than the last. All of the gauges and switches we had seen so far combined were still nowhere near the amount in this room. A red light cast everything in a sinister glow as the ship’s controls covered every surface.

     The main hydraulic controls, auxiliary steering station, dead reckoning tracer, fathometer, trim manifold, diving control station, bathythermograph, ST and SV radar equipment, gyrocompass control panel, interior communications switchboard, forward auxiliary switchboard, air manifolds (10, 220, 600, and 3,000 lbs) and air manifold gauges crowded the evil little room with maleficent intent. Two black boards inlaid with red and green lights indicated which hatches were open and which hatches were closed.

     I couldn’t even begin to comprehend all of this technology. I never stopped to read what gauge indicated what or what piece of equipment each switch operated. It would take all day to learn the room. It would take all year to understand it. I made no attempt and crawled through the next hatch.

     This room, more a hallway, was the officer’s quarters. The captain’s stateroom was just room enough for a desk, a bed, and a sink that folded up when not in use. Not exactly spacious, but the only place with any privacy onboard the Pampanito. And in a metal tube crammed full of 79 other guys, privacy is a valuable commodity.

     Through the last hatch was the forward torpedo room. A narrow chamber, longer and more empty than the others, but still cramped, held spare torpedoes and six torpedo tubes. Surrounded by more pipes, gauges, and levers of justice and destruction. In between the torpedo tubes was a foul arrangement of pipes, hydraulic lines, screws, valves, and chains. An inconceivable mess of copper, gold, silver, and green paint. All playing a role in this undersea death machine.

     I could only imagine what the experience was like for the people who were stuck inside this malicious hunk of metal. You’re twenty years old and underway. Standing watch on the bridge, watching the gray skies for planes and the black waters for ships. Sea spray comes over the bow and freezing wind chills you. With two hours down, the watch is halfway over. Suddenly, a noise. The haunting drone of a Mitsubishi engine high overhead. Before you can scream “enemy plane!” below deck, the dive alarm sounds. Canon fire rains from above as the volleys strike the metal plating below you. You jump downstairs. Another man pulls the hatch closed and dogs it tight. The general quarters alarm sounds and it’s pandemonium. Sailors rush by in all directions. The crash dive begins and everyone holds on. Plates in the galley slide to the floor. Coffee cups tumble. Silverware clatters against the deck. Once the dive levels off, you continue in the direction of your station, squeezing by streams of men as you go. You pass through the engine room. The diesels have stopped, but they’re still radiating an intense heat. The operators stand by in sandals and shorts, already covered in sweat. Just as you reach the aft torpedo room, the lights turn red. Everyone is still. Absolute silence. You listen. All you can hear is your racing heartbeat in your ears. The sweat builds on your forehead and you can only think of what comes next. Something hits the water above. Sinks. EXPLODES! A deafening roar rocks the ship as the metal shrieks and groans. Men hold onto whatever is nearby, waiting for the next depth charge to hit. Another explosion. This one just as close as the last, but somehow more deafening. Just beyond the bulkhead, you can hear water spilling onto the deck. Electricity pops and crackles in the control room. The smell of seawater, sweat, and diesel permeate your nostrils and all you can do now is pray. After an eternity of silent tension, the red lights go out and the regular lights come on. The crew scramble to their battle stations as you take your place by the torpedo tube. You try to see into the control room, but it’s too far. The light of a welding torch emanates from the doorway and the sound of spilling water stops. After more cussing from the control room, the sub eases forward. You can hear the screws turning in the water, but don’t feel the ship ease upward. After another hour, relief comes. You drink coffee in the galley, then after four more hours, pass out in your bunk. You’re woken up four hours later. The air is hard to breathe. The guy in the next bunk over tries  to light a cigarette, but the match won’t light. They have to surface soon, we’re choking down here! The PA crackles to life and the captain’s voice calls out: “general quarters! General quarters! All hands man your battle stations! Hostile ship off the port stern!” The fight isn’t over. You rush to your post and wait. The sub pitches upwards and the diesel engines kick on. The sound is deafening, even all the way back here. The only other noise is from the deck cannon above. The booming thunder of the cannon sounds one… two… three… four times before going silent. A minute later, cheers echo through the other compartments. Word gets back that the gunners up top just sunk a Japanese freighter. You smile and feel pride for your crew, though you can’t help but wonder; “why couldn’t we do it?” You’ve been on the water for a month. Chased by planes, ships, cannons, depth charges, and the claustrophobic misery of submarine life. At this point morality doesn’t matter, and in such a fragile existence, “kill or be killed” has never been truer. “Better them on the bottom than us” someone utters. And you can’t help but agree. Some day you will climb from the depths and step into the light once more.

     Out of the dark confines of the Pampanito, Sam and I emerge from the forward hatch. The sunlight was blinding. My eyes adjusted and we were back in San Francisco Bay. Blue sky and green water. Fresh air.

     “Hey, can you get my picture with this?” I asked Sam, motioning my head towards the anti-aircraft cannon on the upper deck. I reached my phone towards him. He grabbed it, walked away, and dropped it. The little black rectangle hit the metal deck and bounced. My mouth dried up. My blood froze. All of the pictures I’d taken, all of the notes I’d made, everything I had was about to slide down the side of the submarine and onto the bottom of the harbor. No way to listen to my music, no way to call Savannah, no way to call home. Aside from Sam’s phone, of course. He scrambled and recovered my phone right before it slipped off the deck plating.

     “Nope. You’re done. Give it back. You can take it with your phone. Give it back.”

     Sam insisted that he had it this time. I watched him as he carefully walked the thing down the gangplank and onto the dock. I posed under the barrel of the gun and walked off the sub to review. With the picture taken, I tucked the phone into my pocket and promised myself to never trust anyone with it again. Especially near water.

     We walked down the dock towards the SS Jeremiah O’Brien: an old liberty ship from WWII. A long, gray wedge of metal with long arms sticking out over her sides. We paid the entry fee and ascended the steep narrow gangplank onto the metal deck.

     The rest of the ship was closed off, forcing you through the museum first. I didn’t mind it. It was interesting to read a bit about all the men and women who came together to build this ship, and I especially enjoyed the diorama of the Normandy invasion. But there was one thing I was itching to see so bad, it made it hard to focus.

     Finally out of the museum, I led us towards the bow of the ship.

     “I’m gonna show you my favorite part first. This is what I remember most from when I was a kid.”

     I led Sam to the front of the ship. Up a short ladder and we were standing to the side of a three inch deck cannon. I hopped into the right seat and Sam hopped into the left.

     “What are we gonna blow up first, Sam?”

     “See that tower over there? The pyramid shaped one?”

     “I see it. Turning now.”

     I turned the hand crank and the gun started to swing left. I stopped abruptly and spun it the other way, spinning the thing furiously. Aiming through the sights to line up a shot on the Transamerica building. I overshot it and had to crank back a little.

     “Let’s bring her lower.”

     Sam adjusted the elevation until the middle of the building was centered in our sights.

     “Alright, let’s take that sumbitch out.”

     KABOOM! No more pyramid building.

     “What’s next?”

     “Alcatraz!”

     “Alright, trade me.”

     I hopped into the other seat and Sam took mine. He started turning us to the left as I dropped the barrel to the horizon. The rusty crank made the most awful squealing noise as we slowly made our fine adjustments until Sam said we had a clear shot. There was no trigger or lever to pull to fire the imaginary shell, so all there was to do was pretend that the island had exploded into a million pieces of concrete, iron, and dust. Below us, another group was approaching the gun.

     “Let’s let them have a turn. Otherwise we’ll be up here all day.”

     We hopped off and explored the rest of the ship, going up and down steep stairs, through hatches and doorways. The most notable rooms were the bridge and the engine room. The red-decked and mint-walled bridge was surprisingly uncomplicated: a wooden wheel, engine order telegraph, and a few other simple-looking devices put the control room of the Pampanito into perspective. Dropping into the engine room, it was a macro mess of yellow steam pipes, silver cranks, copper boilers, and black catwalks. Looking down through the grated walk revealed a deep pit of piping and machinery. The acrid odor of oil filled the air until we were above deck again. We visited the stern of the ship, then ran right back to the bow.

     Before climbing up, I took a second to admire the pinup painted on the outside of the wall surrounding the deck gun. Miss Tammy O’Brien, with her long red hair, kept lookout for enemy ships and aircraft with her left hand shielding her eyes and her right hand on her hip, dressed in nothing more than a green pair of panties and a white captain’s hat.

     We hopped on the deck gun one more time. We blew up Alcatraz again, the Golden Gate Bridge, the entire San Francisco Skyline. And when we ran out of things to blow up, we started tracking ships in the harbor. Sailboats, motorboats, tour boats. No one was safe. A photographer joined us. We were too busy to notice.

     “We can get out of your way.”

     “No, you guys are fine. I just came up here to get a few shots of the deck.”

     We let him take his pictures, but before he descended the ladder, I asked if he could take ours. I figured we were far enough from the water that another near-disaster could be avoided and handed him my phone. He got some great shots and started down, but before he did, he popped his head up and left us with this:

     “Don’t worry, I won’t tell anyone.”

     And with a wink and a grin he disappeared forever. Sam and I looked at each other with mild embarrassment. Weren’t we a little old for this? I didn’t think so. It’s not everyday that you get to play around on a WWII deck gun with your friend. So while I’m here, on only one of two or three liberty ships still in existence, I’m damned well going to. But we had been on this ship for awhile now, and it was getting to be time to move on.

     We disembarked and headed for an empty Pier 45 warehouse. Within it was a machine gun, a model of the sub, and a few other “museum” items and informational sheets about the history of the Pampanito and the O’Brien. There was also a table with an assortment of old books spread across it. I glanced at the titles, but only one caught my eye: “Batfish.”

     A familiar name. I thought back to Muskogee and wished I had taken a tour. But I had better things to do that day, and this book could tell me more than the plaques and pamphlets ever could. So I paid a dollar and started back inland.

     Fisherman’s Wharf is almost entirely comprised of souvenir shops and tour guides. It was too late for a tour of anything else, so we stopped into a larger souvenir shops to find SOMETHING to bring back to Oklahoma. It was all generic magnets, stickers, keychains, and trinkets marked at relatively high prices even for the bay area. Alcatraz, the Golden Gate Bridge, Highway 1, the 101, weed. Is that all there is on the Pacific Coast? I hunted for a sticker to slap on my beauty box, but found nothing that was worth paying fourteen dollars for. Sam found a jacket, but decided to wait until he needed one this winter. The rest of the store was tee shirts, purses, socks, sunglasses, and personalized license plates. All expensive. All junk. All unnecessary.

     We walked out with empty hands and fortunately not empty pockets. The store was a gross representation of capitalist excess. Nobody stops in for something they NEED, just something they want. And I suppose I’m no better. I had pictures, memories, and blistering feet to commemorate my trip. What good would a sticker do me?

     But this whole trip had been excessive. It was rare for me to say something “wasn’t worth the money” at this point. I wanted to tour a submarine. By God, I toured a submarine. I wanted to drink in Vegas. I didn’t stop until everyone else’d had their fill and wanted to go back to the hotel.

     Thompson had already addressed the excess of Vegas and how it represents American culture, but that was in 1972. Fifty years later and nothing’s changed. I’m not a part of the problem though. No, not me. Never. It’s the people this kind of thing would be easy for. The people who regularly drive their campers up to Lake Tahoe to drink champagne and bitch about profits or the stock market or whatever it is these swine consider important. I had to bust my ass for this trip. I’d earned the time I took off. And it’s important to take it now because there might not be a later. And even if there was, I certainly wouldn’t be young. Could I climb up to the deck gun of the SS Jeremiah O’Brien with a bad hip? I can’t fit my oxygen tank into the hatch leading into the Pampanito. Where’s San Francisco and who are you? Dementia would have me so bad, I wouldn’t even remember my own name.

     It’s foolish to me that people WAIT to live out their golden years. Do it NOW. Worry about the future when it gets here. With the way things have been going, you might get stood up. Why wait on a future that may never come?

     But here I am now, with people hawking tours and counterfeit sneakers to me, reaching deep into my pockets for every last penny. To Hell with these bastards. Coming out here was no easy feat, but the tourist trap has been set and now we’re running the gauntlet to get out alive. There’s facades on every street and scams on every corner. Emerging from the shadows and stepping out into the daylight, these greedy vampires try to draw you in with “cheap” goods and “discount” tours. The only thing “cheap” is the construction and the only thing “discount” is the experience. This is a good town to get burned in. And the iron was headed straight for us. With Sam’s money dropping into the double digits, this was doubly offensive. The salesmen didn’t care that we were broke so long as they made a profit. But I’m not letting them make a sucker out of me. Hell no.

     We split the Wharf quick for one last stop: Haight-Ashbury. The former center of the universe. For a few years in the early sixties, if anything happened anywhere, it started here. This is where a radical movement was born before it was ultimately co-opted. And now look what remains:

     It’s all chain stores, pricey restaurants, and clothing shops. More tourist traps. Shades of the past are everywhere, if you look close enough, but they’re hidden in shadows and concealed in cracks. There’s a man playing an old, broken acoustic guitar on the sidewalk. I can’t hear what he’s playing, but there’s some kind of song echoing from the former shell of what once was. A melancholy tune.

     “That was it. That’s everything” I said.

     “We still haven’t seen the Golden Gate Bridge” Sam pointed out.

     “It’d be a sin to come here and not drive over it. My Lincoln, rolling over the most recognizable landmark in San Francisco: The Golden Gate.”

     We rolled under its tall orange towers and gazed at the sky through the four square portals stacked on top of each other. Since 1937, immigrants, soldiers, sailors, and travelers passed beneath the very span we were crossing now, into America, into the West.

     All we’d seen so far has been the West. The white sands of New Mexico, the orange plains of Arizona, the golden hills of California. All West. All beautiful. Now I can understand why people would come here.

     We rolled down off the bridge and into Sausalito.

     “Holy shit. Gas is eight dollars there” Sam calmly exclaimed.

     “I’m so glad we took this trip in the middle of a gas crisis. Otherwise it might be cheap and we’d be tempted to do something silly like save our money. We’ll hit a station on the way out of town. We’ve still got a hundred miles or so in the tank.”

     I guess that’s it. We had nowhere else to go but home. We stopped to fill up a while later and turned northward. Out of the city we ran right into a traffic jam. We were stuck behind a blue and black love bus adorned with all kinds of stickers for what felt like forever. Finally past the stoplight that had held us up, we were on a straight road between the bay and a marshland, unknowingly passing The Lone Toilet on the way. Then the long dull drive to Sacramento, squeezing through mountain passes, cruising past small towns, and rolling down farmland until stopping in some idyllic no-name town for more cigarettes and a gas station dinner.

     The palm trees stood tall in front of clean houses with those hideous rock lawns so unique to areas in perpetual water crisis. The streets were full of pristine, dustless cars, and the empty sidewalks bordered every block. I imagined the kind of people who lived here. This was a crimeless community where Pop coached the little league team and Junior played varsity. Mom went grocery shopping every Tuesday and Sis talked all night on the phone. Kids played street hockey until the streetlamps came on and nobody sped because there was never any rush.

     It felt like a more intimate look at the copy/paste hell-de-sacs we passed coming into L.A. It was a designer community, with each palm leaf trimmed to perfection and cars parked a uniform distance from the curb. It was made for TV. Your favorite shows were filmed here. Don’t you wanna be like them? A nuclear family. A nuclear community. A nuclear bomb.

     KABOOM! The western sun turned to a ball of fire, blowing up the shopping district downtown and casting a spectacular orange light on the facades of the neighborhood. Good thing the list was short this week, huh Mom? As she takes the eco-friendly paper sacks out of the back of her trusty old Toyota van, the tires melt and whatever she puts in her hair to maintain those curls the neighbors are jealous of catches fire. Pop waves to the kids and is suddenly blinded by the flash. He drops the bat bag as the team roster burns to ash, erasing the names of little Billy, who hit his first home run today, and Tommy, who caught the ball and saved the game. The windshield of Junior’s Camaro, which he worked hard mowing lawns all last summer for, melts onto the dash. The radio goes to static and the leather seats shrink and crack. The line pops and fizzles as the phone burns Sis’ hand. The glass inside the faux-wood cabinet turns to goo as MTV is lost and the screen goes black.

     The heat intensifies. They dry up and roast. Like all-American hot dogs roasting on the fire in fast-forward. The blast comes and showers them all in splinters and shards before wiping them off the face of the earth completely, like a wave wipes out shells on the beach. The whole state shakes violently then slips under the surface. Water rushes in and cools the ashes. California is no more.

     Especially not for us. We kept pushing east. The cities and fields slowly gave way to trees that grew taller and greener. We were going right through the Tahoe National Forest. The Lincoln struggled uphill in low gear all the way to Emigrant Pass. But the saving grace of burning so much gas moving uphill, is that you save it going down. We flew downhill and rode the brakes on the curves. Coming around, there were clearings where we could see for miles. Endless forest, a sea of green. There was a rest area up ahead.

     “You think we should spend the night there?” I joked.

     “Where? At the Donner Pass rest area? I’m good. I’ve already eaten today” Sam replied.

     There was a big yellow sign, warning: “STEEP DOWNGRADE NEXT 5 MILES.” I let off the gas and carved my way down the winding road, only applying the brakes when necessary. We were rolling fast, but why should I worry? The concrete barrier will save us. As we neared the Nevada border, the trees grew sparse, exposing the rocks and stones at the foundation of these hills. We really did get to see all of California. We came in through the desert, up through the eastern range, along the coast, into the valley, the gold hills, then to the coast again, and finally through forested mountains. And now we were ending our California experience in the same biome it had began.

     “WELCOME TO NEVADA.” The road turned from slabs of California concrete to blacktop Nevada asphalt. Reno was just ahead. We stopped at an In-N-Out one last time before saying goodbye to the chain for an indefinite amount of time. I took my burger and vanilla shake to the car and tried to call Savannah. No answer. I called her twice. I didn’t even know what I wanted to tell her. Moreso, I just wanted to hear her voice. Warn her that we might come through Cimarron one last time before heading home. I met Sam at a table outside and we shared the final full meal of our Western Adventure. The sun was to our backs and sinking fast.

     Back on the road, I was sipping my shake and missing Savannah.

     “Can you roll my window down?” Sam asked.

     “Yeah, that sounds like a good idea, actually.”

     We lit up American Spirits and smoked in silence. It paired awfully with the shake.

     “Hey, I wanna talk to you about something” Sam said.

     “Sure, anything.”

     “What was going on with that girl in San Francisco?”

     “I already said, she was a prostitute coming for my money. I didn’t want to, so she left me alone.”

     “That’s not what I mean. How did you end up in that situation with her?”

     “Flirting with her?”

     “Yeah. And buying her a drink.”

     “I don’t know. I didn’t think I was going to get anywhere with her. Was I supposed to take her back to the hostel?”

     “Man, I think the thing that bothers me is that you did it without Savannah’s knowledge. Have you guys talked about that sort of thing?”

     “We tried to in Santa Fe, but it never went anywhere.”

     “I think you should talk about it. Think about what’s going to happen when you tell her, how hurt she might be.”

     “I know. I’ll talk to her the next time I see her.”

     “I’m just trying to look out for you. From the way you talk about her, you really care about her. And I don’t want you to sink your relationship over a miscommunication.”

     “I know. I’ve thought about it a lot since San Francisco and you’re right. I’ll talk to her.”

     It was true that the guilt had haunted me. I was annoyed with Sam for bringing it up because I already knew what I had to do. But I couldn’t do it yet, and I was under enough pressure from myself. I didn’t need Sam pressuring me too.

     We kept rolling down I-80. To our left was small, scrubby hills. To our right was a flat, scrubby plain. The sun was falling below the horizon and I could see long shadows of cowboys and pioneers stretch across the wastes. I encouraged Sam to get some sleep before I’d need to trade off. The sky fell and it was only me and the taillights ahead. It was the loneliest stretch yet. Two cowboys, beat to shit, tired, and headed home. But home ain’t over the next horizon. It’s not over the next ten horizons. If we were lucky, we’d be home by this time tomorrow. A full day away.

     I wasn’t feeling too lucky. I wanted to get home so I could put my feet up and rest. But I wasn’t ready for the trip to end either. There were no places left to go and nothing left to see. Just cruise control, steering, and the occasional cigarette.

     Out of the black emerged the red and green glow of gas prices being advertised to the whole desert. I pulled over in Lovelock to fill up, then let Sam take over the wheel while I tried to get some shuteye. The first time I woke up, Sam’s music was too loud and I accidentally snapped while asking him to turn it down. A few miles later he made me apologize. I rested my head against the door pillar and passed back out.

PURGATORY

     DELLE, UTAH

     JUNE 16TH, 2022

     The second time I woke up was when Sam nudged me awake.

     “Hey, brother. We’re about to run out of gas.”

     I looked over and saw that our projected range was only 26 miles. Sam had burned over 400 miles in the past four-and-a-half hours. Must’ve been a damn good sleep.

     “Just keep rolling. It’s too late to turn back now.”

     The road was empty. The night was black. The stars dared not shine, for they knew they couldn’t compete with the glow of the moon. Sam was livid.

     “I figured since we’re in the salt flats, SURELY there would be a gas station somewhere out here. But no. Not a God-damned thing for miles.”

     There’s no telling how long ago we had passed through the last settlement. And according to the big green signs, Salt Lake City was well beyond our reach. What would we do? Wait until morning and call a tow truck to bring us gas? How much time would that lose us? Then, shining like a beacon against the black, was the white sign for a Sinclair station. Sam filled up while I found a bush to piss in. The dead grass against my bare ankles was sharp and made me miss my high-shafted boots.

     Back in the car, I stayed awake as Sam drove us through a quiet Salt Lake City, then passed out as we approached the tiny little gap between the mountains that leads out.

     Dawn’s light found me in Evanston, just over the Wyoming border. Sam stopped inside a gas station and I kept my eyes closed for awhile longer. They opened suddenly when Sam abruptly pulled over onto the side of the highway.

     “I’m falling asleep here man. Think you could take over?”

     “I don’t see what other choice I have, but yeah, I can drive.”

     I took over and rolled us down long, straight stretches of interstate. Flat scrubland stretched out and up into buttes. Wind turbines shot up through the horizon. We passed a big truck stop: Little America, after seeing signs advertising the pie, coffee, and clean restrooms for the last fifty miles. More yellow and green prairie, the Sinclair oil refinery. I wondered if an unseen gas leak from the plant would reach my cigarette… I took a sharp drag and waited. Nothing. Nearing Laramie, the hills got greener. Cow herds trudged along to greet the sun. Odd panels made of dark boards lined the edges of the fields. We exited I-80 for Highway 287 and followed it down into Colorado. The front range lay silent and blue to our southwest. A left at Owl Canyon, the third exit at the roundabout, a right onto I-25. It was a long, straight shot to Denver. Construction and traffic held us up significantly. Sam had stirred from his rest, but both of us were still tired. Not from this part of the drive, but from the whole trip. For the past week-and-a-half, we’d been moving non-stop. Santa Fe, Vegas, L.A., Frisco. Moving between the stops was nothing at this point. Sit back, relax, and watch the whole American West pass by in a fantastic blur of red, white, orange, tan, green, and blue. But once at our destinations, the destruction was senseless and wanton. We’d pushed to the edge of the continent and when we fell over our sanity had fallen with us. There was no way to unsee everything we’d witnessed and there was no way to undo everything that we’d done. But it had taken a toll on us. A full night’s rest was nothing to be expected, and our livers and lungs were begging for some reprieve. A rest was needed. Not a nap or sleep, REST. Staying in one place for a second, relaxing. Not having a timetable or a place to be. We needed rest, we needed to go home.

     As soon as we hit Denver, I routed us through Raton. It’d be sweet to see Savannah one more time. Plus, there was still an unfinished conversation that was now more important than ever to finish. A billboard for the Denver Meow Wolf reminded me. First of Santa Fe, then of Vegas.

     “We aught to get everyone together to go to that someday. It’d be fun to get Austin and Tanner in on a Meow Wolf experience.”

     “Austin loves Colorado anyway, and there’s plenty of reason to go to Denver.”

     “Could you imagine taking Tanner into a place like that? Imagine him tripping around an alternate universe.”

     Our conversation was suddenly interrupted. Siri was rerouting us. The road to Raton was closed, meaning we wouldn’t be dropping through New Mexico, and I wouldn’t be seeing Savannah. It was entirely unfair. Our alternative fate now was to drive through Kansas. If we stuck to the interstate, it would take about six hours. It turned into a tollroad before it headed into Oklahoma and going to the center of Kansas seemed like a waste of time and gas. I wanted to get home faster. I picked a new route that dropped directly south into the panhandle of Oklahoma. We’d save two hours and miss a lot of Kansas that I didn’t want to see in the first place. I turned off the interstate and onto Kansas state highway 27.

     I knew it wouldn’t be fun, but I never imagined it would be like this:

 The fields were empty and the horizon was bare. There wasn’t a landmark in sight. Not even telephone poles to run parallel to the road and remind us that there was still civilization out here. Occasionally, a car would come down the opposite lane, but this only happened so many times I could count it on one hand. I still had Sam, but I didn’t have much to say aside from how much I was staring to hate Kansas. Other than that, there wasn’t a word between us aside from him occasionally asking me to roll his window down. It’s a good thing the switch on that door was broken, otherwise the whole ride would’ve been quiet. But even if there was something to say, it was let go or left silent; we were too busy listening to Hank Williams.

     Finally, Sam broke in with some quip about how nostalgic he was for places like this, having grown up here and all. My face twisted up with the same disgust you’d have when hearing somebody giggle as they kicked a puppy. What is there to love? The wheat? The dirt? That’s all there is here. Wheat, dirt, and despair.

     It wasn’t the “wrong” route, but it sure as hell wasn’t the right route either. I was supposed to be in New Mexico, driving through open desert and endless prairie, twisting and turning past little mountains and streams, tasting her kiss, still burning on my lips.

     But no, I was stuck in Kansas. It’s all one big damned field, divided by an old gray road and a few barbed wire fences. And it stretches on forever. There’s no sense of time or direction here. There’s no north or south anymore. You’re just going, with no direction whatsoever, with a vague notion that Oklahoma was somewhere over the horizon. I remember making a series of turns and figuring that I was heading back the way I came. But this is what Siri wanted, and she allegedly knew the way home. She said we were projected to get there just before midnight. How much longer until then? How much longer would we be in Kansas? How long had we been here? Would we ever get out?

     I started to feel panicky. Claustrophobic. Trapped. We actually died last night and I didn’t feel a thing. I was fast asleep. Waking up this morning wasn’t really waking up. We found ourselves in a place we had never been and drove to purgatory. And there’s no place to turn around.

     Who can say this is all real? Who can prove I’m still alive? The faces in the cabs of the grain trucks were all dead too, damned to forever drive, just like I am now. Damned.

     We pulled into a town for gas and drinks. The eyes behind the counter and in the aisles were cold. I hadn’t talked to another person aside from Sam since ordering a burger in Reno. I should be hysterical, jumping up and down at the thrill of meeting another living, breathing person. But I was skeptical. The girl behind the counter wasn’t real. The cowboy at the beer fridge was an illusion. All of this was hallucination and I’d wake up any minute now covered in blood as the EMTs fought desperately to bring me back.

     But no such thing happened. No matter how long I waited.

     An immeasurable number of miles down the road, Sam turned and asked: “when you get real quiet like that, you’re not mad, are you?”

     What I should have done was disarmed the cruise control, pulled onto the shoulder, jacked it into park, turned my head and said “yeah. I’m pretty pissed off. I think you oughta walk the rest of the way.” Before inevitably bursting into laughter at his confused reaction.

     But we didn’t have time for shenanigans.

     “No, of course I ain’t mad.”

     “Just in deep thought?”

     “I like to turn my brain off. Just put it on auto pilot and clock out for a bit.” Reassuring words to hear from someone holding the steering wheel, doing 78, I’m sure. But that’s all you could do here. I felt bad for Sam not having a damned thing to do but think, and smoke occasionally. I was fortunate enough to have an entire car to manage. Keeping the wheel straight, setting the cruise control, watching the temperature gauge and the gas gauge, as well as watching the road ahead. But all it would’ve taken is a quick glimpse dash, then you could look at anything else, if there were anything else, before having to look back down.

     Great white grain elevators appeared on the horizon, and for what felt like an hour, it slowly grew closer. My grandpa joked that Kansas is so flat, he stood up in his truck bed and watched his dog run away for three days. He wasn’t kidding. And it isn’t funny.

     This town showed more signs of life than the villages before it. There were recognizable fast food restaurants and chain stores lining the road. The first signs of civilization. REAL civilization like the city we were heading to. This was still a far cry from the OKC metro, but it was bigger than the hamlets we had rolled through over the last hundreds of miles. Out of town, we fought to pass grain truck after grain truck. Trying like hell to maintain a top speed so we could get the hell out of here as quick as possible.

     Our final stop in Kansas was in Liberal. I needed gas and we needed dinner. Just up the street from the Phillips 66 was a Braum’s. There may be hope for us after all. I snapped out of my death delusion and pulled into the drive-through. I ordered, paid, and began to wait. I had been waiting far too long. Maybe this was a cruel trick and the true purgatory is right here. The food will never come, I’ll never make it home.

     The Devil himself, disguised as a teenager, suddenly slammed open the service window and handed us our food. His pimpled face bore a more angelic appearance now. But eating it here wouldn’t be right.

     “We should wait. I don’t want to eat this until I know I’m home. Then it’ll truly be Oklahoma Braum’s, and not Kansas Braum’s” I said.

     “How far is it to the border?”

     “Five miles. Do you think you can make it?”

     “I hope so. It’ll be worth it.”

     And with that, we were off. Just a few more blocks of city streets until the open road. The speed limit was forty-five and my foot itched to slam the gas. Relax. Show restraint. You’ll be there soon enough. We rolled down a street lined with industrial yards and machine shops. I could feel the warmth of the bag between my legs. How long had it been? Two weeks? Too long.

     The buildings disappeared behind us. We each took our #4’s out of the bag. My stomach growled. The road curved, setting us up for a straight shot into the 46th State. We unwrapped them and poised them in front of our faces. My mouth began to water and I could taste it already. A white sign bearing the words “Welcome to OKLAHOMA” and the ODOT star greeted us. As soon as we passed it, I bit down.

     There’s no joy in purgatory. But there is Braum’s in Heaven.

     I ate my burger so fast I almost choked. Finally, a taste of home. The liminal and surreal prairie had transformed into a familiar and welcome sight. Seemingly, the landscape hadn’t changed drastically once over the border. If you didn’t look closely, you might still think you were in Kansas. But our surroundings were definitely Oklahoman and definitely ours. That’s my sagebrush. That’s my prairie grass. That’s my burnt-out meth lab. We were finally home.

     We had to go through the panhandle one last time. In the daylight, it was new, fresh, and took forever to cover. I’d missed so much at night, just driving straight for hours without any landmark to tell you how far you’ve made it aside from the shrinking miles on the instrument cluster’s calculated range. But in the light, it had a new, friendly appeal. The sun reflected white in all the cattle pools off in the bright green fields to our left and right. Course strawgrass grew in patches that sprawled all the way to the horizon. And pretty little white flowers grew so close to the road, you could almost see the bugs circling around them. Sunbleached asphalt rolled quickly underneath as wispy clouds eased by above, like giant heaps of cotton that had been pulled apart and set free to float up to the sun. I missed this place.

     I’d seen a lot of land in the past eleven days, and all of it had a unique and variable beauty. I missed the sandy scrub fields of northeastern New Mexico, and the white, rocky hills of Arizona and Nevada. The cool gray waters of the California coast to the bright green slopes of the rolling Wyoming grassland. I missed every state and every spot because of its natural beauty. But not Kansas.

     Fuck Kansas.

     Though, I had come to understand Sam’s soft spot for his home state. Beauty can be found in all things, and he saw something in Kansas as a child that I failed to see as an adult. And to an outsider, the brown and green prairie of western Oklahoma where I grew up might be described as “flat” and “boring.” But the land that I called home is what I had missed most of all.

     Elmwood, Slapout, May, all the way to Fort Supply was open fields and endless sky. The hills became more pronounced on the way to Woodward, but from there, not much changed. By the time we reached Seiling, the sun was falling and a deep melancholy had set in. I guess this is it. The Great American Road Trip had reached its end. The further the sun went, the worse I felt. The barren wastes of Dewey County complimented this immense heartache of mine as we moved through a hauntingly beautiful hellscape.

     It looked like the state was on fire. The trees stood black and bare as we drew nearer to home. By the time we got on I-40, it was pitch dark. We rolled the windows down and bounced down the highway to cool night air and muffled music. I knew Sam wanted to get home tonight to be with his girlfriend, but I had no reason to rush. I knew the next week would be spent recovering, and I didn’t have anywhere to be until the end of the month anyway, but I felt an odd sense of urgency for myself. Like I HAD to keep driving. I HAD to keep going. Maybe it was just an instinct from having driven all day. A reflex. Get there. Go. Hurry! But there was no reason to rush at all. Truthfully, I wasn’t ready for it to end. I’d had such a good time and I wanted to keep going, but all good things come to an end eventually. The good times never last. The sun had set on Oklahoma and the trip in general. In less than an hour, it would be all over.

     The road passed beneath us like quicksand. As the miles grew shorter, the time grew longer. And the closer we got, the longer it took. Pure, muted, Oklahoma wasteland lying dormant in the dark. Until: the lights of the city began to shine on the horizon. The Devon tower lit up like a beacon, drawing us home. Now we were back in familiar territory. The street lampss lit our path and every light in the city seemed to be shining just for us, celebrating our return. Everything looked the same, yet felt so foreign. This wasn’t the Strip in Las Vegas. This wasn’t the hills of San Francisco. This was a lot of things, but it wasn’t “home.” Not after spending so much time away.

     “Do you want to cruise down Main Street?” Sam asked. I took the first exit for Norman and rolled down Flood.

     “One last cigarette?” We lit up and cruised down empty streets to “Stuck in Mobile With the Memphis Blues Again.” The black windows of Main Street hid a warmth behind them as I gazed into all of my favorite spots. The restaurants, the bars, the stores. All empty now, but resonating with the echoes of times passed behind these loving walls. I hit a pothole on Porter, and that’s when I felt it: yeah, I’m home.

     I pulled up to my house just as the song ended. Perfect timing. We didn’t screw around long with saying goodbye. The trip was over and that was it. Everything goes back to normal for awhile. Sam hopped out and headed to his home across the street and I hobbled inside with only the essentials: My bag, my journal, and two beers.

     I drank the PBRs slow and recounted everything from the salt flats to now. By the time I had caught up to the present I was feeling pretty good. But I couldn’t write much about the road trip as a whole aside from the fact that it happened, I enjoyed it, and it was over.

     What was the trip’s significance? What was the point? Was there any to begin with?

     It would be easy to say no. It was simply a few days on the road in places that are important in the American cultural cannon, but that wasn’t the whole truth. It’s a simple fact that Las Vegas, L.A., and San Francisco are some of the most recognizable cities in America, but what compelled us to go there? It was more than just a whim, it was a requirement. A duty to see, experience, and make it out alive to report back on the truth of what these cities actually are.

     We placed our bets in Vegas and hit the jackpot: that great hot cesspool is a place where every kind of person comes together, from poor Okies to Saudi princes. The hands are dealt randomly and a game of chance has no regard for skill. But we got very lucky in what we saw and who we saw it with: Sam and I were grateful to see Austin, but I think him seeing us was a kind of joy no slot machine or roulette table could ever measure up to.

     We busted the assumption that Los Angeles had its own individual image and turned it on its head: L.A. is a patchwork of everywhere else. Maybe the blend of cultures and broad relatability is what makes it great. The downside though is that the familiar places it emulates is unextraordinary: a cheap caricature. The town becomes nothing more than a set, waiting for the cameras to start rolling.

     San Francisco is… An enigma. It’s the first thing travelers from the Far East see, but it was made by all the people pushed out of everywhere else in America. It’s an abbreviation of all the cultures rolled into one bag and spread out on the hills overlooking the bay. It could be Los Angeles, but it’s more authentic. From what I heard, and what I saw, San Francisco is the epicenter of degeneracy. Not from within, but without. Every loser, hippie, beat, junkie, spazz, and prostitute in the nation flocked to the Golden Gate City at some point and never left. Even if they did, their filthy cultural imprint has left an eternal stain. But there’s beauty to be found there, if you have the eyes to appreciate it.

     But the destinations speak nothing of the journey it took to get there. The thousands of miles covered, the hundreds of conversations had, the countless sights seen. I don’t know what Sam got out of it, but I was happy to be his guide, even though I myself didn’t quite know what to expect. We survived eleven days in each other’s company, and our friendship was stronger because of it. We’d bummed and boozed our way across the West together and no one could ever take that from us. That trip was solely ours.

     But it wasn’t just me and Sam. Austin and his girl were there. Savannah played a significant role too. I’ll never forget the time we spent together and the way she made me feel during that short stay in New Mexico. The fact that I made a detour specifically to see her says more about the way I feel about her than I realize. It’s still to early to be exclusive, but I’d sure like a conclusive answer as to what she wants and what we are soon.

     THAT was our road trip. The cities in and of themselves may have been worth the visit, but I wouldn’t have had the great time that I did without my friends by my side. No piece of the trip can be separated from the broader experience, but the story is only half told. Surely, there’s more to come.

     But it won’t be for another week. In the meantime, I need rest. I need sleep. I sat the pen down and fell into the now unfamiliar routine I’d practiced every night for the last year, save for those eleven days on the road. As I crawled into bed and lie motionless, I could still feel the vibration of the highway in my aching feet.